Stranger Than Fiction
by m3thod-mak3r
Summary: Media to Fiction to Reality...Axel finds himself in the gloomy world of Fiction, the purgatory between Media video games, movies ex and Reality. If he can reach Reality, he'll finally be able to get a heart...A lil AxelxOC
1. Grave

Axel was dying. He felt his consciousness fading as swiftly as sand, drifting into that dark tunnel which lead to the next life...or perhaps for a Nobody like him, nothing at all. Where did Nobodies go when they died? Without hearts, what hope was there for a life after death? _I'm running out of myself_ thought Axel calmly _After all those times faking it, this is what it's like to really die. _Axel knew he had done well to help out Sora, even if it was for his own selfish reasons, but beyond that, no absolution came with death; no voice to tell him if he had done good in his life, or evil, or anything at all. There was no flash of realization, of appreciation or knowledge of any kind. Just the creeping feeling of his mind growing fuzzy and tuning out. But despite this lack of closure, Axel really only had two regrets as he dissolved into nothing, like so much ash. _I'm sorry Roxas...I'll miss you...if only I had a heart to stop beating when I..._

Then Axel, renegade member of Organization 13 was gone.

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Cool and damp. Axel could not see or hear but he felt...a clammy sensation of stubborn wetness that clung to his body and drenched without rain. _Is this death? _Wondered Axel. But he didn't really feel dead. He felt dizzy and uncomfortable, both were very mortal sensations. Axel flexed his fingers experimentally. There was the familiar crinkle of glove, along with a thick, wet noise. Axel swished his arm, and the noise grew tenfold. Wet leaves. Slowly, Axel opened his eyes. Far above him, a canopy of grim, green trees attempted to hide a grey sky. Thin streaks of thunderless, purple lightning crept from cloud to cloud like snakes. The alien sky was as strange as the trees themselves, which were nearly 100 feet tall, with skinny little trunks no larger around that Axel's palm. This trunks supported no branches, save the regular tufts at the very top. These trees had thin, smooth bark which was a peculiar shade of silver. Cautiously, Axel turned his head to examine what was beside him. The forest floor was blanketed in a thick crust of brown tree leaves, and the leaves themselves were obscured by a dense shroud of chilled mist.

With surprisingly little effort, Axel propped himself up on his elbows, then stood up with catlike slickness. The lack of difficulty was 'surprising' for the simple reason that Axel thought that death would have taken more out of him. And besides, Axel had left his world feeling exhausted, beaten and in a word, drained. But where ever he was now, he felt pretty much okay. Looking at the strange trees, the wet leaves and the monotonous sky split by occasional lightning, Axel asked the silent woods, "Where the Hell am I?" But it seemed that no answer was forthcoming.

There was nothing for Axel to do but drift through the infinity of the forest. It was a grossly silent place, with the mist holding all sound at ground level. Axel thought he heard a movement to his left once or twice, but it might have been his ears compensating for the silence. Despite the lack of underbrush in the strange forest, visibility was limited by the fog, which seemed to have the strange trait of thickening in the distance. _Maybe I'm being followed...maybe I'm not. Whatever._ Thought Axel, his small grin affixed to his lips. Of course he wanted to stop, to think about things, to figure out why he had died and ended up here. But questions would slow him down. When he found something to ask, he would get his answers. Until then, Axel let himself be ruled be curiosity and stored his fretting for later. But Axel was also no fool. Questions or no, he thought this new world was probably dangerous. _What place isn't?_ He thought with a little grin. With an experimental flex of will, Axel called for his chakrams. Instantly, he felt their familiar weight in his hands. He called the twin weapons swam with fire, giving the surrounding mist a peculiar red glow. It occurred to Axel that his fires would have burned off any ordinary mist, but he was past attempting to apply the 'normal' rules to this place.

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Axel was not human, and he did not know weakness the way humans do. But after hours of wandering in the grey purgatory of the forest, even Axel's strength began to wane. As Axel began to feel the miles and hours in his calves and thighs, he remembered his last moments of life, the dull knowledge of overexertion, the ache of an empty body. Axel was not an easily rattled man, but the recollection of his own death persuaded him to stop. "Dandy place to make camp." Axel commented aloud to himself. Then he shook his head, sending the baubles on his cloak swinging like pendulums, "Great...this is how it starts...first you're talking to yourself, then your in some funny farm, convinced your Scarlet O' Hara or something like that." Grunting, Axel employed a trick which he had learned while the Organization was still house hunting. Taking Axel thrust his chakrams into a thin tree trunk, side by side to form a sort of platform. Leaping delicately onto the broad faces of the chakrams, Axel arranged himself so he was reclining on the chakrams with his long legs hanging off the side into open air. This method would have failed any other man with any other weapons, but Axel's chakrams seemed to have learned the trick to anti-gravity, and though they were clinging to the tall tree with the barest edges of their teeth, they would remain there, quite sturdy, until Axel demanded their release. "Not very comfortable, but it'll do." sighed Axel. Then he blinked, realized he had talked aloud to himself again, and added and angry, "Shit."

So Axel slept in the strange misty afterlife into which death had roughly cast him. The indifferent sky remained the same, flat grey, and the trees were not startled by even the lightest of breezes. Here, in this forest where nothing seemed to move or change, Axel was a lone Tinman; a fiery lost soul.


	2. Grit

"I'll sleep as late as a fugging want to, Demyx." Axel retorted, tiredly. He was dreaming, seeing the past, but slowly becoming aware of the present. Demyx said something, and Axel rolled over to ignore him/her...and right off of his sleeping platform. "Shit! What the Hell?" shouted Axel as he hit the ground hard, rudely awakened by his fall. But the ground was no longer wet or covered in a strange mist. In fact, it was difficult to see the ground at all. Thick tangles of vines, low bushes and weeds formed a think, tangled mat which obscured the forest floor almost entirely. In fact, Axel has the great misfortune of landing in a messy plant with long, light purple vines, which were decked with a heavy array of sharp thorns. Cursing even more loudly than before, Axel torched the bush before it could deal any additional damage.

After the thorn bush had been crisped, Axel examined his surroundings. It seemed clear to him that by some supernatural means, he had been transported to a different place entirely. Though the sky was still grey with the strange purple lightning, the trees did not seem so eager to reach it anymore. In fact, they did not appear to be the same type of trees at all. Here were tame, familiar trees: pines, oaks, and sycamores, all growing to conventional dimensions which did not confound the eye. The only strange tree which remained was the one Axel had stuck his chakrams in. Among the other trees, it stood out like a silver matchstick, tall and thing and even more alien when presented against this tame backdrop. Kneeling at the silver tree's base, Axel noticed a little cool mist still clung to its base, like a remnant of a forgotten world. Axel wrenched his weapons from the silver tree's trunk, and watched as blood red sap crept from the scars left by the chakrams. And then, without sign or warning, the silver tree was gone, and replaced by a hefty oak. The chill mist had ran with it; retreated to Axel's memory.

Axel observed this event from underneath raised eyebrows. "Well, that was...unexpected." Shrugging off this bizarre happening as either a result of insanity or just one more side affect of being dead, Axel wandered off into the new woods, slashing brambles and lighting things on fire as he went. The thorn bush had put him in a foul mood.

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After hours of merciless slicing, Axel stopped by a fat oak to rest. "Damn. This place is fugging boring." he whined aloud, observing a smouldering twist of plant life at his side. _I hadn't really thought about death much or anything, but I really never thought..._Crackle. Axel's thought process was interrupted by a stealthy noise from a few yards away. Had this been an ordinary forest, Axel would have passed it off as a small animal foraging among the leaves, or some similar nonthreatening source. But Axel had not even seen an insect since his arrival in this strange afterlife, much less a squirrel or anything like that. Another brief rustling swam under the silence. Whatever was making the noise was concealed by the thick underbrush. _Not some happy forest creature. _Thought Axel, _Whatever this is, it's hunting me._ Two bullets lanced from the brush, piercing identical, circular holes in a trunk off to Axel's left. _Hunting me with a gun. _Axel amended. Casually, Axel pretended not to have noticed the shots. A less observant person then he could have missed the rounds; the shooter had a very effective silencer clipped to his weapon. Shrugging, Axel pretended to bend down and slice another offensive thorn brush. However, he twisted transformed the movement into a violent attack, sending a brilliant river of flame in the direction where the bullets had come from. A strip of undergrowth was twisting and crackling in the wake of Axel's attack, but no screams of pain were heard. No cries for help, no thick aroma of cooking meat. _Well, whoever it is, they're either fast or smart. One way or the other, I think this is going to be pretty interesting. _Appraised Axel as he slipped into a defensive stance.

"Who's there?" demanded Axel, a snarl curling his thin lips. At first, the dark forest gave no reply, save indifferent silence and the occasional cracklings of fire. Then, another two bullets flew past Axel. One splintered a twig no more than two inches from his left ear. _That was a little too close for comfort. _Thought Axel as his snarl deepened. Rather than retreating into the woods, Axel ducked low to the ground and began charging the shooter with frightening speed. Axel thought he was on the right course, and about to burst into the sniper's hideout out with chakrams blazing, but then another two bullets whizzed by Axel, nearly glazing his distinctive hairdo. The shooter seemed to be circling; changing it's location. Quickly, Axel altered his path through the brush, heading right at the shooter again. Just when Axel was about to quit being sneaky and start lighting things on fire again, something leapt from the bushes and slammed Axel into a thorn bush. Axel should have been able to dodge such a blow easily, but the ex Organization 13 member was tired, and his guard had been down. Now nestled uncomfortably in the barbed wire of the thorn bush, Axel felt something hot and metallic nuzzle up to his temple.

"Don't move." The command came from somewhere above Axel, "I tend to shoot first and ask questions later." the harsh voice added. Axel grinned, "A wise philosophy." he replied, lashing out at the gun toting assailant with a chakram and a tongue of flame. The shooter grunted with surprise at Axel's speed, but he somehow managed to avoid injury. However a second voice, high pitched and annoying, yelled, "Ah! Hot! Hot! Hot!" Axel twirled to his feet and faced his attacker for the first time.

The man was holding a large weapon, which was really the center of Axel's attention. The carbine was unlike anything Axel had ever seen in his travels, even those to other worlds. The gun was large and unwieldily, and it required both the man's hands to operate. The barrel was aimed directly at Axel's chest. The man toting the gun was strong, with long arms and a broad chest. Had Axel not been in mortal combat with the man, he would have made a passing, rude remark about the man's slouch, which Axel considered to be terribly rough hewn and unsophisticated. The man also had strikingly green-blonde hair, and hilariously long pointed ears. His clothes were dirty and ruffled, with the blue leather straps across his chest faded and the large silver circlet they held in place tarnished and dirty. And, though surprisingly clean, the man's hair was long and apparently naturally feathered, with long locks curling over the man's nape and down his back. On one of the man's broad shoulders, a small orange animal was nursing a comically singed tail. The creature was about two feet tall, seeming like a combination of an otter and a weasel, with big ears and petite little goggles strapped on his forehead.

The man wasted no time recovering from his evasive maneuver, attempting to stage Axel with a volley of sharp little bullets. The gun gave a little muted pop as it loosed each shell. _Blood silencer._ Cursed Axel as he, quite literarily, dodged the bullets. The gunner looked shocked that anyone could possibly avoid his shots. Axel's grin widened, _Clearly he hasn't done business with the multi-world famous Organization._ Continuing his tendency for the unexpected, Axel charged the shooter with inhuman speed, green eyes trained on the black barrel of the gun the whole time.

While the gunner had an advantage at a distance, Axel knew he would have the upper hand in a melee battle. Axel leapt with the delicate ease of a cat, holding his flaming chakrams at the ready. The man had the good sense to dodge the blow, but he sacrificed his balance to achieve the feat. As the man staggered, the orange animal on his shoulder shouted uselessly, "Whoa! Whoa! Watch those slicey things!" Axel wasn't sure what the animal was, but the more it spoke, the more he wanted to kill it.

Axel dove in to finish the man with a few quick cuts by his chakrams, but the shooter was more intelligent than he looked. Axel found himself peering into the black infinity of the gun's barrel. However Axel, a rather quick draw himself, had a chakram positioned at either side of the man's head. _Huh. Standoff._ Considered Axel as he contemplated the gun.

"Who the Hell are you?" demanded the man between heavy breathes. His eyes were narrowed with hatred. The animal was scared to the point of pissing. "I'll be asking the questions." said Axel easily, a shade of distaste creeping into his voice. The orange animal seemed to sense the exponential anger between the two men, "Ca...can't we all just get along?" it suggested cautiously, leaping off the gunner's shoulder and backing away. "Get out of here, Dax!" barked the gunner. "Bu...bu..." the animal, _or 'Dax'_ Axel surmised, seemed unwilling to abandon the gunner, and the gunner seemed to be eager to save the little furball's life. Axel was eager to take advantage to the situation. Grinning a little, Axel pointed one chakram at 'Dax'.

"Tell me who you are, or I'll roast your little pet here." said Axel coldly. "Hey! I'm no pet!" barked Dax, "I'm sick an' tired of people think I am either a snack or a piece of clothing. Axel's chakram blazed to life, casting a red glow on the animal. It, thankfully, shut up. "Hurry up." Axel hissed. For a moment, the man simply glared at Axel, but then, for fear of his pet's health, caved with an angry, "Fine!" Axel leaned in close to the man, "Start talking." he ordered softly. The man began, "My name is Jak and the orange guy is Daxter. We came from a video game we're trying to reach Reality." Axel gave Jak a look he mostly reserved for the clinically insane, "What the...never mind. Where am I? What is this place?" he demanded, prodding threateningly at Daxter. "This is Fiction. The badlands between Media and Reality. You mean you didn't know that?" "How the Hell should I have? I didn't see any welcome signs, did you? And, oh yeah, what the Hell do you mean 'Fiction'?" Axel snapped. Jak sighed, "Wherever you came from, it was Media. Humans from reality make up all kinds of Media. They created your world, your past, your future, everything. They created you! Characters in Media only really achieve free will after the Human writers finish their game, or movie, or TV show or whatever. But some residents of Media want more than that. Some want to move to Reality, and get a real heart and soul. That's why I left anyway."

Axel froze, the anger in his face shifting to shock in a matter of second, "Get...a heart?" "Yes!" Jak said, through gritted teeth. "If a denizen of Media makes it through Fiction and into Reality, the become human, with all the fancy perks. You know, free will, emotion, a soul, a heart all the fun stuff. Until then, we're just programs." "You're lying!" Axel snarled, "You're a fucking liar. I died, do you understand? I died and showed up here!" Jak took advantage of Axel's temporary distraction to spin away from the imprisoning chakram. Using one heavy, tattered boot, Jak kicked Axel over and pinned him to the ground. "I'm no liar. It really pisses me off when people think I am. You want proof though? No problem." Jak snatched Axel's right arm and flicked back the sleeve of the black standard issue Organization cloak. Tattooed on the underside of Axel's forearm was a small C inside a circle. "That's a copyright mark. Shows you're an Original Media character. I've got one too. So does Dax." Jak removed his right gauntlet, revealing an identical 'c' tattoo. Axel stared at it, comparing it to his own. "See? All true." Axel retorted, "Can't be..." but the conviction was gone from his voice. "You got a better explanation? You said you died? This sure isn't Heaven, wouldn't you agree?"

Axel glared, then turned his head, resting his cheek against a leafy vine, "Lemmie up, bastard." he said, softly. Jak released his hold on Axel with unnecessary roughness. "Don't flame me." he snapped. Axel stood slowly, but with careful grace. He did not retract his chakrams. Jak was still glaring at Axel as he clipped his gauntlet back on. Once again, the strange woods were silent, except for the low snaps and cracks of burning vines. "Ehhh..." Daxter filled the awkward silence with a curious noise. His expressive face was marked with confusion and more than a little impatience. "Now that you two have THAT out of your systems eh...what's next?" Axel glared at Daxter, causing the animal to shrink back behind Jak's large feet.

"You said you were going to Reality? To get a heart?" asked Axel, staring at Jak with eyes still small with anger. "Yeah." said Jak casually, but an edge of suspicion still marked his tone. "Sounds like we have a goal in common then. You know the way?" Axel watched as Jak rolled his eyes skyward, watching the lightning make its transient marks there. "Not really. I've been looking for the door for years though." Jak looked back at Axel, "But I do know the rules. Fiction doesn't run like Media or the real world." Axel shrugged, "Tell me about it. I went to sleep in one forest and woke up in a completely different one. Sort of. But you know, in my previous life, I was good friends with a guy who made a living finding doors to other worlds. He taught me everything I know. Sort of." Jak smiled. Just a little, but it was earnest, and a little devious. "Well if we can put aside our differences, I think we might just be able to help each other out." Axel returned the grin, a little snort of laughter escaping from between his lips, "Well, I've never been much of the partner type, but since it seems like you need the help, I'll come along with you guys." Jak;s grin widened, "I'd hate to leave you stranded alone in the woods, with no one to save your ass when trouble pops up. You can tag along. What's your name, anyway?" "I'm Axel. Got it memorized?"

And so with a handshake that was more a test of strength, the two men struck an uneasy treaty, coated with sarcasm and perhaps just a strip of uneasy trust. Daxter, who was really against letting Axel, on board, concerned himself with his tail which had, once again, been lit on fire. As Daxter stamped on the burning fur, Axel tried to look innocent.


	3. Girls

Axel, Jak and Daxter plunged through the underbrush, interrupting the stoic silence with heavy footsteps and occasional curses. None of the group seemed prepared for friendly conversation. That is, except for Daxter, who had a complaint for almost every situation. "Ya know Jak this...is really boring." yawned Daxter as he began to scratch his belly lazily. "You only say that because YOU aren't the one doing the walking." Jak retorted, pushing his way through another bush. Axel smirked, "I thought you two said you had been in Fiction for a while." "We have been." panted Jak, "Why?" "One would think that after all that time here, your little friend there would be used to the conditions." said Axel shrewdly. "What can I say? He just can't let go of the luxury we had back home." said Jak, with something that was almost a grin. "Heeey! I spent THREE games riding around on your shoulder, narrowly avoiding DEATH, dealing with cruddy Precurser crap, and being soaked in unspeakably horrible things, not the least of them being Metalhead innards and raw sewage! WHERE is the 'luxury' in that?" shouted Daxter, punctuating each word by jabbing his pointer finger in the air." Axel rubbed the bridge of his nose in irritation, "How do you put up with him?" he asked Jak. Axel didn't get physically tired easily, but being around Daxter seemed to drain him of all his energy. "Have to. We're brothers." said Jak with a shrug which nearly dumped Daxter to the vines. Axel was about to ask if Jak was serious and, if so, how something like that might happen when yet another thorn snagged on his cloak.

"Damnit!" hissed Axel as he undid the snag. Then he snapped impatiently, "Hey Jak! Get your ass out of my way. I'm gonna start damaging things, particularly these thorns. And I can't say that I'm not tempted to take ratboy there down with them." Jak spun around, a look of anger tempered with horror on his face. "No! Don't make any noise, and put the chakrams away; they'll slow you down." he whispered harshly. Axel smirked _Slow ME down? This guy really has no idea who he's dealing with._ He thought, then aloud he added, "What? You like getting ripped to ribbons by thorns?" "No! And keep your voice down! We're about to exit the safe zone." Jak's voice was lower and more raspy than ever. He was starting to hunker to the ground, though Axel did not think he was doing so consciously. "What the Hell is so safe about miles of shitty thorn bushes?" asked Axel with a little laugh. Jak leveled his gun to Axel's head. "Shut up. Get low to the ground." ordered Jak. Axel smirked, "I thought we were over this." Jak toyed with the trigger, "Now." there was a real fear nibbling at Jak's voice, and Axel decided to do as told. Scowling with distaste, Axel lay among the vines and wet leaves. Jak was nearby, holding his gun at the ready, but more for comfort than anything else. At first, there was no sound. Hardly a wisp of breath seemed to escape the lungs of man or Daxter. Axel was beginning to think that his guide had lost his mind when, from the incomprehensible depths of the woods, there was a slight sound, _Is that...laughter?_ Wondered Axel.

Shooting Jak a questioning look, Axel saw the other man was staring into the woods with the grim expression of a man fighting against fear. To Jak's credit, he was doing a good job of it. It only really showed in his eyes. However, Jak didn't seem like the sort of man to fear mere death. _No...whatever is in the woods is something worse than a monster._ Thought Axel. Perhaps he should have been afraid, but without a heart, the emotion had no place to spring from, and Axel was quickly losing his memories of what it was like to feel.

The woods around Jak and Axel began to fell with sounds; chatter, laughter and a crescendo of footsteps. Female voices, disarmingly high and sweet, drifted like siren songs among the brambles. Then the voices died down, like a breath of wind. Soon, the sound was slack in the silence, but Jak and Axel still lay against the wet ground for some time afterward. All the while Jak's long ears were pricked, their sharp tips racking the air for the slightest sound.

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What felt like hours later, Jak finally stood. First he rose with slow stiffness, swinging his head back and fourth to check for danger. Finally, he for motioned Axel to stand, but Axel remained pressed against the ground a few moments longer. Axel really didn't trust Jak's judgement when it came to danger, and besides, if some hidden enemy was stalking the group well, _Better him than me._ Thought Axel as he waited for something terrible to happen to Jak. When nothing did, Axel stood with reluctance, glanced about to check for any enemies Jak might have missed, then wheeled around to face the blonde man. "Why the Hell did you have me dive in these fucking thorn vines, at gunpoint no less! To get away from some fucking schoolgirls?" snapped Axel. Jak simply sighed, "See, this is why you're lucky I'm such a great guy and let you tag along. Those girls could have...well..." "Giggled at me?" asked Axel, his voice dripping with sarcasm and venom. Summoning his chakrams, Axel took a quick step towards Jak, "Now tell me why the Hell those girls were so dangerous, or I'm out of here." demanded Axel. Jak shrugged, "You're not doing any favors to me by sticking around, but all the same I hate to see what those girls can do to people." "Tell me." demanded Axel in a cold, flat voice.

Jak sighed."Those girls are virtual representations of Humans. It's very hard for Humans to make it to Reality in person; there's only one door to each world. But, unluckily for Originals like us, they can still access Fiction and corrupt our data." explained Jak gravely. "Wait, 'corrupt'? What the Hell is that supposed to mean?" demanded Axel. "Once a Human catches you, they can warp your personality. Make you do stuff that you wouldn't ordinarily do. They want you gay? Then you are. They want your best friend dead? You'll do the killing. They want you to fall madly in love with their fan character? They can make you. It's worse than dying. They take away your identity." explained Jak. "Like you know what dying is like. Why can't we just mow through these avatars?" asked Axel, smirking at the bright blades of his chakrams. "I can do the damage, if you're too squeamish, Jak." Jak snorted, "The only avatars you can take out are the ones representing Humans who have broken copyright laws by not giving credit to Humans who created us. And even if you do damage an avatar, the Human can come back later. Hurting avatars doesn't injure the Humans that they represent. Either way, avatars are dangerous. Running is really the only way to escape them. Otherwise they overwhelm you and then...well...you're never the same. Even if you run, there are tons of them all over Fiction. You're never really safe." _All I need to do is outrun you. _Thought Axel. "Can they really alter your personality like that?" asked Axel. Jak nodded, "Humans never seem to think that the Original can be the best. They have this need to put their own spin on characters. Obviously, at our expense."

Axel absorbed this. "So...Humans from Reality and Originals from Media...who lives in Fiction?" Jak gave Axel a sidelong glance, "Fan Characters. FC's for short. Actually, when I ran into you, I was heading to a FC village." Jak admitted. "Why?" asked Axel, green eyes flashing with interest. "FC's are created in Reality by Humans, but they end up in Fiction somehow. I have a theory that the door to Reality might be located around one of their villages." Axel considered this, "And what did you mean by 'safe zone'? You said earlier that we were leaving it...?" Jak nodded, "Around the door from Media to Fiction, there is a small perimeter where avatars can't enter. Probably just to give the newly arrived Originals a fighting chance. A lot of avatars roam around the outside of this perimeter, trying to catch unsuspecting Originals on their unawares. If I'm in the area, I usually swing by the door and see if anyone needs some help." Axel arched a suspecting eyebrow, "You help them by...shooting at them?" Jak shrugged. You were a special case. You didn't look like you would be open to advice, and I didn't want you as a weapon for the avatars. They do that, you know. The avatars? If they catch a powerful Original, they program him or her to track down other Originals and bring them to the avatars. Didn't wanna risk it."

Axel retracted his chakrams and raised his arms in a long stretch, flexing his lean body this way and that. "Huh." was all he said, but internally, he was weighing his options, _If these avatars are half as much trouble as Jak says, it will be worth having four extra eyes at my disposal, even if one pair of eyes does belong to a rat-thing. _Jak shrugged again, "I'm making camp. I'll take first watch." Axel smirked again, "And how are you going to know when to wake me up, if you don't have a watch and this place seems to lack a moon or a sun? And how do I know that you won't run off while I'm sleeping and make some kind of trade with the Humans?" Jak glared at Axel for a moment, "I'll wake you up when the forest changes. And as for me running off...well...I won't." Axel's green eyes met Jak's and he evaluated the other man, _He's telling the truth. Honest man. Honest fool._ Axel's smirk widened to an outright malicious grin as he drifted off to sleep. Jak, as he had promised, stood guard, listening for any hint of Human presence.


	4. Guess

Axel was dreaming crimson. His consciousness was slumbering among his internal fires; drifting in their cinnamon embrace. Only here was he honest. Only here was he safe. But dreams are transient, as memories, and soon Axel's visions of flames shifted to something frightful. Slowly, the fires dissolved into blackness, as though some dark hand had plucked them out of existence. Gradually, ruby light spun into an obsidian infinity, leaving Axel in complete darkness. It was not a comforting darkness either; not one of the familiar corridors which Nobodies often tread. Here the blackness was empty and thin; not a pliable thing which bent to Axel's will. It was as if the air had simply taken on a velvet cast.

And it was cold; the absence of the fires had drawn a strange winter close. Axel began to shiver as he attempted to make sense of the absolute night. His eyes were useless, since the darkness did not betray even a scrap of light. But, even without his eyes, Axel could sense there was something stalking him in the dark. Something silent and cold.

An invisible smile slunk over Axel's lips as he called for his chakrams. _Whatever it is, it's in for a surprise._ Thought Axel. But the nightmare was not prepared to let it's prey gain the upper hand. So, defying reality, the chakrams would not appear in Axel's expecting hands. _Shit_ thought Axel, raising his fists to provide himself with at least a little defense. But suddenly, the dark hunter was upon Axel, putting it's cold fingers on Axel's shoulder in a twisted sort of caress. Growling, Axel spun and grabbed his attacker's wrist...and dragged himself from the dream.

Jak was standing over Axel, gritting his teeth, "Dammit Axel! I was just trying to wake you up! Are you trying to break my fucking arm?" he snarled. Axel, already fully awake, smiled cooly and said, "Sorry." Axel applied a little more pressure to Jak's wrist before releasing it. "I'm not really a morning person." Jak frowned and rubbed his wrist, "Go to Hell." he grumbled. "You can get rat boy to wake me up tomorrow, if you want. I can't guarantee that I wont break him, though. What I did to your wrist I could easily do to his spine." Jak simply glared. Axel gave him a sly little smile in return, then examined his surroundings.

Unsurprisingly, the forest had changed again while Axel was sleeping. Though it remained cast in the same disinterested grey, the trees had become scrubby little pines, the kind which spent centuries being twisted by wind on the tops of high, red precipices. In both Reality and Media, these ancient trees were rare and reclusive, seeming to thrive on isolation. However in this latest incarnation of 'forest', there were acres of shabby pines. Axel touched the rutted bark of the tree which had served as his pillow. He considered asking Jak why the forest changed like this, but Jak didn't seem to be in a 'helpful' mood.

"The forest has less cover now, and almost nowhere to hide. Wake me up is you see any movement." Jak ordered as he slumped to the ground, which was now hard and dry. Falling asleep in a nest of wet leaves and brambles hadn't been easy, but Axel figured Jak was worse off than he had been. Jumping to his feet and doing a long, catlike stretch, Axel chuckled a little as Jak squirmed on the flat dirt.

"Mornin' sunshine!" came a loud voice at Axel's feet. Looking down, Axel saw that Daxter had slunk out from behind a tree and, with uncanny accuracy, calculated the most obnoxious place to stand: right in Axel's way. The Nobody hated being boxed in, mentally or physically. Anything impeding Axel's progress risked being, quite literally, burned. "Shouldn't you be sleeping?" asked Axel, making layering his annoyance and dislike with deceptive nonchalance. "I took my break the same time you did. Jak told me to keep an eye on you." said Daxter importantly. Axel grinned, and summoned his chakrams, "And what would you do if I started to run off?" he asked maliciously. "Uh..." stammered Daxter as he backed away slowly, "w...wake up Jak?" Axel laughed and retracted his chakrams. "Slick plan rat boy. Real slick." he mocked. "Eh...you aren't actually planning on running off...are yeah?" asked Daxter nervously. "If I was, why would I tell you? Hmm?" said Axel with a little smirk.

Daxter stood at Axel's feet for a few minutes, giving the Nobody nervous glances and fugitive suspicious looks. Finally, Daxter reconciled himself with a sigh, plunked down on the ground and began fiddling with his goggles. After removing the tiny pair, Daxter extracted a small pocket watch from behind of on the lenses. It's glass face was ribbed with tiny cracks, and the gold case was very dirty. "Stole it off a rabbit." explained Daxter as he held up his prize. Axel raised an eyebrow. Daxter's gaze slid to the ground, "Actually...we stole it off a dead rabbit...Jak and I...we don't know what happened to the rabbit for sure, but I think Johnny got him. I mean, the rabbit was dead when we found him, right? But he was all...skinned and...nasty. Yeah, skinned alive probably, then pinned to a tree by a spear stuck through his mouth. Lemmie tell yah, it was pretty grue. That bunny sure picked the wrong rabbit hole to stumble down..." Axel stared blankly at Daxter as the animal fiddled with the watch, "It's a good find though." explained Daxter, "Manufactured stuff; it's really hard to come by in Fiction. Cause everything keeps shifting around, right? It's hard to find stable ground to build factories on and stuff. That's what Jak says anyway."

Axel waved a long arm, indicating the woods, "Why does it change, anyway?" Daxter looked up from the watch, "What? The woods? Well eh...Jak said it's got something to do with the fanfictions Humans write." "Fanfictions?" asked Axel, a memory of curiosity creeping into his voice. "Yeah. Yah know, the stories Humans make up with the Originals they catch. Sometimes there are FC's in there too. The fanfictions, I mean. Anyway, the settings of those stories are reflected in Fiction. So says Jak." "How often does it change?" asked Axel as he plucked some needles from a nearby pine. "Every 12 hours on the frickin dot. It's spooky." reported Daxter. Axel nodded at Jak, who seemed to fall asleep quickly but sleep lightly. "When do we wake up?" Daxter tapped the watch, "6 hours. Then we walk for twelve. 6 hours after Jak wakes up, that's when the forest will change again." Axel considered this in silence as Daxter dug something else out of his goggles. It was a small cube with rows of multi-colored squares on the sides. Daxter twisted the cube, rotating the horizontal and vertical rows independently, and cursing softly all the while. "Some watch you keep." Axel commented, "Hey! Back off! What am I gonna do huh? I can't see above that little rise over there. I'm good at listening though. I figured I would leave the 'watching' to you." Daxter said defensively, not looking at anything but his cube.

Axel shrugged, leaned against a tree and glared at the woods, which bore his surly expression with silence. Without the distraction of walking or arguing with Jak, Axel's thoughts began to creep out of the places he had hidden them. Here was a quiet time, occupied by thoughts of hearts and Roxas. Axel had never really wanted friends, or money, or power. But getting a heart and saving Roxas, these two things utterly consumed Axel, occupying his thoughts, driving his actions and choosing his path. Axel had gone through his Nobody un-life killing and betraying people...and it had done him no good. Roxas, who most considered to be nothing more than A cheapened version of Sora, as gone and, by most, forgotten; no he simply made up some corner of the keyblade wielder's heart. And speaking of hearts...

"Shit!" exclaimed Daxter. Axel glanced at the animal with curiosity and mild amusement. Daxter had managed to line up the same colored squared on one side of the cube, but the other five sides were a hopeless mix of color. Axel smiled a little as Daxter went back to work trying to make the colors be one to a side. Apparently, copious amounts of cursing were beneficial to this process.


	5. Guest

4 hours into his guard shift, Axel spotted movement in the woods. An observing human or an inexperienced Original might see the mass as a pocket of shifting shadows mimicking the brushes and eddies of breeze. But there was no wind to stir the trees, and this shadows seemed to move in practiced concert. Marching. Axel considered running and leaving Jak and Daxter as a sacrifice to these new creatures. But, inconveniently, Daxter was still awake, and working angrily on the cube. _Might as well alert the glee club._ Thought Axel with a little grim resignation. The memory of the feeling was not as pungent as it should have been, realized Axel realized. _My 'feelings' have been fading faster since I got here...I wonder why..._thought Axel as he traced the path of the moving things, emerald eyes shrinking to slits in concentration. The creatures were not black, as Axel had first assumed, but brown, with bands of color which were probably clothing swathing their diminutive forms. The figures held a black flag above them, in direct contradiction of Jak's statement that most Originals took great pains to stay unnoticed. _I suppose not everyone fears these avatars as much as Jak does. Maybe the man's just crazy._ Axel considered. He was entertaining that hypothesis more and more.

Axel gave Daxter a not-so-light kick and hissed, "Daxter, there's someone out there." Daxter froze, his mouth still curved over a half-formed curse word. Packing the pocket watch and the cube back into his goggles with a silent, practiced swiftness, Dater peered into the woods, attempting to follow Axel's gaze to the alleged 'movement'. Axel was about to summon his chakrams when he felt the tracings of tiny claws race up his cloak, "What the Hell?" he snarled quietly. Daxter clambered up to Axel's shoulder, where he perched like some sort of annoying orange parrot. "I couldn't see from that ground. Relax. No seriously! Your shoulders are all boney and tense. Take it from a shoulder connoisseur, that kinda thing ain't good for anybody. You wanna end up like Jak?" Axel sneered. _It will take more than a few avatars to make me tense, and it would take everything to make me an Anybody. Hearts are hard to come by._ Thought Axel. Then he demanded aloud, "Who the Hell is out there?" Daxter said nothing at first, but he did lean forward on Axel's shoulder, squinting his big eyes and pressing his ears flat against his head. After a few seconds, Daxter hopped down from Axel's shoulder with a graceless little leap. "What's the damage?" asked Axel. To his surprise, Daxter was grinning, "Those guys are okay. Lemmie wake up Jak. He'll talk to them." Striding over to the sleeping man, Daxter cheerily slapped Jak across the face and declared, "Hey big guy! Rats!" Jak was awake instantly, "You don't need to slap me, dumbass. Anyway, rats?" Daxter nodded to confirm, "Yep. Black flag and everything." Jak stood slowly and examined the group for himself. Apparently, Daxters diagnosis of the situation was correct, because Jak nodded with satisfaction. Then he shot a sidelong glance at Axel, who was trying not to laugh at the slap induced blush which was spreading over Jak's right cheek. "Surprised to see you here." said Jak evenly. Axel grinned a little and gave and innocent shrug, "You had your guard weasel chained to my foot." "Ottsel!" corrected Daxter with sudden anger. Jak shook his head at the 'ottsel's' antics and said, "I'll hail the rats. Hold one a second." Jak cupped his hands to his mouth and gave a low call which sounded to Axel like "Pika-a-a-achu!" The company of squat figured halted and spun their banner three times as a sign of recognition. "And the purpose of that little exercise was...?" asked Axel, giving Jak a double eyebrow raise. "To make sure they aren't being tailed by avatars." explained Jak "They're clean, so we can move in."

Jak approached the crowd with a mock-brazen stride. Axel assumed that he was trying to intimidate, or at least impress, these 'rats', but Jak's defensive slouch betrayed the man's anxiety. Axel brought up the rear, his chakrams just a thought away. As the Nobody examined the group of creatures, he saw that the 'rats' were just that...anthropomorphic rats. There were about 20 of the creatures, all dressed in identical black and white striped shirts, black pants and red berets. Daxter, who had resumed his post on Jak's shoulder, indicated the banner the rats held aloft, "It's a flag they used to hoist over ships and towns when the populace got infected with bubonic plague. Hilarious right? These guys slay me." said Daxter honestly. Axel shook his head and sighed.

Jak gave the rats a little wave, and one of the rats stepped forward to give a hearty wave in reply. "Ah! Iz thiz Jak ahnd Daxzter? Oui, vat luck! You boyz are truzly blessed." the rat spoke with a heavy French accent, which Axel had no appreciation for. "Ah! And who do ve 'ave here Jak?" asked the rat slyly, "Did you dump Daxzter for zom new boy friend?" the company of rats shared a burst of nasal laughter as Jak rolled his eyes and Daxter flicked the rats off with enthusiasm. The memory of disgust rose powerfully in Axel, wrinkling his nose and twisting his mouth in distaste, _These rats don't know how wrong they have it!_ Thought Axel, throughly nauseated. "Ah! I zee your friend here is not zo familiar with our little joke." said the rat, still laughing. As he recovered from his spasm of gaiety (which was only prolonged by the expression on Axel's face) he added, "Ah, we apologize, Monsieur. It iz juzt zat Monsieur Jak and Monsieur Daxzter are zaught after by many fangirlz who wish to make them eh...gay lovers. Zey are one of zee moszt popular fan pairings, oui?" Axel suppressed a shiver of disgust, "I thought you said you and rat boy were brothers..." he said to Jak. Jak rolled his eyes Heavenward, and watched the purple lightning creep quietly about the sky. "Yeah...not by blood though. We were raised as siblings though. And even if we had the same parents, I don't think it would stop the Humans. They get some crazy idea and..." Jak trailed off. _No wonder Jak is so scared of these avatars. Who wants to end up banging their own brother?_ Thought Axel. Then he turned back to the rats, asking, "Who are you guys anyway?"

The rat leader laughed, "Vee are Originalz, az you are. However, we were but peripheral characters in zee zecond Sly Cooper game. Zee main character killed use off in zee droves, and ve ended up here, oui? Zince we were not very popular characters, we are mostly ignored by zee avatars. Ve wander Fiction quite freely, actually." "Where you guys headed?" asked Jak, crossing his arms, and still fuming over the 'boyfriend' joke. "Down to zee swamp beyond zee safe zone. Bad business in the mountains, non? Very many avatar are zer now, and FC's and Originals are dizappearing all zee time. Ve want to be safe until zee whole thing blows over, oui?" Jak nodded, "Did you pass the FC village on your way here?" the rate leader nodded, "Oui, it is ztill there. Naturally, we did not go so near, but I think it waz still populated." While Jak absorbed this, Axel asked, "Are you trying to get to Reality?" the rats laughed as one, "Non, non Monsieur, ver are perfectly fine here, oui. In Reality, we would simply be trapped by a rat catcher, non? What use does Reality have for rats? Here, we live without fear, except for some FC's and we have good business, non? Here is good." Axel nodded. The rat's explanation seemed logical. Then something occurred to him, "How did you know I am an Original? My tattoo is covered." The rat leader gave a wheezing laugh, "Vee know Jak isn't a savage, this is how. Oui?" Axel was confused, and was about to ask the rats to elaborate when Jak spoke up, "Are there any streams nearby?" he asked, "I've been dry for about three days now. It's wearing me down." The rat tisked, "Pah. You vill kill yourself with that sort of thing, Jak, the not drinking. Ah, but you are in luck, a stream is nearby, she is maybe, oh, two miles toward the desert. Keep walking the way you are, and you will not miss her, oui?" Jak nodded his thanks, "Right. I'll see you guys later. Maybe do a little trading with you if I find anything good in the desert. Sound good?" The group of rats murmured to each other in low, excited french, "Oui, that's very good." said the rat leader, practically drooling in anticipation. "Zee you soon, Monsieurs!" And with a final nod, the leader rat faded back into the ranks of his fellows, and as a man, the group began to march again.

Jak watched them leave, his eyes swimming with suspicion. _Hm. Sometimes Jak is almost as trustless I am, I suppose. I have to admire that kind of utter detachment. Even Nobodys have trouble resisting the allure of trust. _Axel thought as Jak slouched into his intuitive 'low profile' posture, _Now the question is did Fiction do this to him, or was he always so paranoid?_ "Let's get moving." Jak barked, "I want to get to that stream before the forest shifts again." Axel gave Jak a curious look, "Not going to finish your beauty sleep? I can hardly stand looking at you as you are. Without a nap you must be a monstrosity." Jak rolled his eyes, "No I'm not, but thanks for your concern, bastard. I've can do without sleep, but water I still need." then a glimmer of recognition seemed to flit behind Jak's dark pupils, "Hey. You don't seem thirsty. Granted, you are in better physical shape than most people who show up in Fiction, but still, it takes awhile to get used to the smaller rations. You got some secret stash you aren't telling me about?" demanded Jak, his face twisting with anger. Axel gave Jak a little half smile, "Maybe you should finish your nap. You're being rather cranky. But to answer your question no, I don't have any food or drink. I don't require such sustenance. Or cleansing." This did not surprise Jak. During his years in Fiction, he had met many strange people and animals, and not needing to eat or bath was certainly not an uncommon trait among Originals and FCs "So, what are you, like, a half elf or something?" Jak asked as he turned around and began marching again. "Excuse me?" asked Axel, taking up the rear of the column. He no longer needed to use Jak as a thorn plow, but it was always good to stand behind people, _The better to stab them in the back._ Thought Axel, recalling one of his favorite adages. "Elves. I met one once. He told me a whole boat-full of his people had come over from some book called Lord of the Rings, but their party had been separated in an avatar ambush. He needed to eat, but he didn't get dirty or anything. I mean, he had been wandering around in the wilderness for about a month, his cloths and hair were like new." explained Jak, combing his memories for more details. "He looked a little like Jak." added Daxter, "But white-blonde. And pretty." Jak rolled his eyes again, "Thanks for that Daxter." Axel snickered.

------------------------------


	6. Greed

"Tramping around in boring-ass woods must by the national sport of Fiction." declared Axel. Jak had promised that they would be upon the much anticipated stream "any minute now." for the past 4 hours. Axel attempted to portray a cocky and snide demeanor at all times, but annoyance had finally broken through that thin, casual veneer.

"Things change in Fiction, dumb ass. I can't help if the fucking stream moved. It can't have gone far though. The forest hasn't changed yet." growled Jak.

"It would be a lot more convenient if you didn't need the fucking stream in the first place." replied Axel, "No wonder you haven't found Reality yet. You spend half your time searching for streams that, apparently, exist only some of the time."

"You know Axel, your right. I should give up all my moral luxuries like say, eating and drinking, and become a whatever the Hell you are." Jak retorted, his voice chilled with mocking sarcasm. After a moment's thought, Jak asked, "What are you anyway?"

_I've been traveling with you for how many days, and only now you decide to do a little background check? How did you survive out here? Dumb ass. _thought Axel. Though he longed to pose the question out loud, he determined that simply answering the question might be a better course of action. The hiking was dull enough without reenacting already staged battles, "I'm a Nobody. Capital 'N'. And Daxter, before you even think about it, I have already heard every joke imaginable about being a nobody, so don't even start. It would break your loving brother's heart if I had to kill you." Daxter couldn't resist a little snicker anyway.

"Go on." asked Jak, with genuine, but not perceptive, curiosity.

"Basically, when my human self was killed, there were two bits left of me left behind. One was a Heartless, which is a sort of a physical manifestation of the darkness in my heart, and the other was a Nobody, which is the shell of memories and personality left when my heart was stifled. And I'm the Nobody. Though I function, for the most part, as an ordinary human, I don't have any real emotions or feelings. I don't experience new feelings; rather, I simply relive the memories of past emotions. I can add more memories to my shell, they really have no impact on my person, since I can't change my heart based on experiences. You should commit that to memory."

Jak absorbed this and asked, "So, did your Heartless come to Fiction too when you died?"

"Maybe. I was a Nobody before I came here though. I was killed in my world, my Media as you would say, and lived on, sort of, as a Nobody. But then I got killed as a Nobody as well."

Jak whistled, "Squandered your second chance, huh? Pretty rough existence you have then. I mean...dying once is enough for most people..." Axel took issue with the word 'squandered' in Jak's statement. Helping Sora, and whatever hint of Roxas remained within him, had not been a waste of precious life. Axel was mostly concerned with his own welfare, but for whatever reason, he did not feel as though his ultimate sacrifice had been misguided.

"Oh! But that's why you want to get to Reality, I bet, right? 'Cause you are all...no heart-y...and you get a heart when you become Human when you go to Reality, like Jak said, right?" babbled Daxter in excitement.

"Brilliant, Holmes." said Axel, as he pinched the bridge of his nose in annoyance.

Jak was interested to discover more about Axel's status as a Nobody, but suddenly a faint tinkling noise perched on the tips of Jak's long pointed ears. "Water!" he said, filled with guarded excitement, "I can hear it. Let's get this over with."

Axel, for once, was in utter agreement with Jak. However, as the two men hurried to the water, a few warning bells began to nag at the edges of Axel's brain. _Jak's running...pretty quickly...there is no ground cover...avatars could easily notice his movement...why is he doing this though? But...how long was he without water? Is he delirious? _Axel decided that this was likely, and snatched Jak's failing arm from amid it's spiraling orbit, "Dumb ass! What have you been telling me this entire fucking trip about keeping your head down and shit like that? Your charging through the fucking forest certainly isn't my definition of stealthy. Snap out of it!" Axel quipped in a low rumble of a voice. When Axel had first stopped Jak, the other man's eyes had glowed with an truly ferocious anger which Axel had not yet seen manifest in Jak's face. However, the truth dulled Jak's emotion, rendering the man sane again, it seemed. Jak nodded with recognition of Axel's statement, and headed through the woods again, this time at a slower, less suicidal pace.

"How did you survive out here? Axel asked with a small grin and a theatrical shrug. "Traveling with you is like flying from one near train wreck to another. Who stopped you from killing yourself before I came along?" Jak ignored the question, though Axel suspected that far from being callous, Jak was simply too distracted by the allure of water to even register the comment.

"Ah! There we go." said Jak with satisfaction.

A slender, clear stream, only about two feet wide and a foot deep, slunk around the roots of the crimson trees. Though Jak was too mesmerized by the water to notice anything but its shimmering, the strangeness of the stream was not lost on Axel. The ground around the stream was flat and dry, as it had been for miles, but the stream had a definite, even enthusiastic, flow. Another oddity was that the stream had no 'flood plain'; no small band of fertile ground or ravine to accommodate overflow as the result of rain. The stream simply filled its crevice to the brim, slipping along at a level which was exactly even with the hard ground. _Crazy fiction._ Thought Axel as Jak lapped up the curious water like a dog. Daxter drank too, though not as deeply or desperately as his humanoid companion. _Perhaps ottsels are more adaptable than...whatever Jak is._ Considered Axel.

His musings were interrupted when Jak snapped, "Do you mind?" Axel raised his eyebrows as he examined the other man. Jak was hunched over the stream like a feral thing; water and saliva sprayed across his mouth and goatee. His leather braces and gauntlets were already discarded beside the stream.

"I'm trying to take a fucking bath here." he explained testily. Axel and Daxter wrinkled their noses in synchronized disgust. "Ug...bastard. You could have just told us to shove off for awhile. The last thing I need to be thinking about is you fucking naked. Foul." Axel turned around and stalked away from Jak, feeling nauseated and thinking, _Way too much information._ Daxter, clutching his stomach while miming vomiting, followed Axel's footsteps. Axel looked at the little ottsel and asked with sympathy, "How do you put up with him?" Daxter shook his head and shrugged his shoulder, "I donno. It must by my natural...eh...temperance. Yeah. That's it. I'm just that um...temper...mental? No, not that. What I said before."

The memory of a grin snagged at Axel's mouth, in spite of his nature. "How long do you think he'll take?" Daxter rolled his eyes. "ForEVer. Although, for me, its worth it. I mean, I don't want his greasy, stinking hair smacking me in the face while I'm riding around on his shoulder." Axel snorted with amusement, "Well, it wouldn't surprise me that he would have such an extended cleansing ritual considering how...feminine his is."

Daxter raised an eyebrow, "You're eh...not really one to talk buddy." he said. The humor dropped from Axel's face as though it had been weighted by lead. Apparently born without the 'know-when-to-shut-the-Hell-up' gene, Daxter continued talking, "I mean seriously! Both of you are silky haired pretty boys. I'm not even human and sometimes I think I am more of a man than Jak or you."

"If being a mangy, flea bitten rat makes you a man, I would have to agree." said Axel tersely. Daxter stuck his tongue out at Axel, then removed his goggles and extracted his pocket watch. "Jak better hurry up. Being in the Boarderlands during a change isn't good." "Boarderlands, hmm?" asked Axel as he peered at the watch's grimy face. Daxter nodded, "Yeah. Between the forest and the desert. Miserable place. Stuff is always changing there. Like, the forest tries to grow into the desert, and the desert tries to swallow the forest. Stuff like that. Really shitty. Passing through there is a bitch at the best of times, but if we try to cross over into the desert during one of the normal, 12 hour changes...erg. It's something no sane person would try. But Jak...ya know." Daxter made a stupid face and, with his pointer finger, drew circles in the air next to his ear. Axel took this to mean, 'He's an utter lunatic.'

Daxter sighed and plopped onto the ground, fishing his cube from his goggles again, and re-christening it with a fresh string of curses. "I swear...I can never get the sides to match up. I mean...fuck!" Daxter exclaimed. This time, he had managed to get three sides matched up perfectly, but he was unable to reconcile the snarl of colors on the remaining sides. Axel smirked at the ottsel's efforts. Frustrated, Daxter jammed the cube back in his goggles, and stared thoughtfully at his pocket watch, "Though...about what I said before...Jak actually isn't crazy. He seems like it sometimes, but he isn't."

"Hm. A brother's loyalty. Though that is honorable enough, it doesn't make Jak any saner." Axel said, a little smirk firm on his lips. Daxter cocked his head up and looked at Axel, holding the Nobody's mocking, green eyes in his own. "You say that but...he's not crazy. He's gotten loads of Originals out of tight spots, yourself included. Think about that before you make fun of him again." Axel blinked at the uncharacteristic honesty and seriousness in Daxter's voice. Axel shrugged, holding his long arms out in indecision, "We'll see."


	7. Gimmick

Axel and Daxter were sitting side by side' Daxter filled the awkward silence with curses, as he had returned his attentions to the cube. Axel watched with interest as Daxter struggled mightily with the plastic squares. Axel was closer to feeling at ease than he had been for a long time. Despite the obvious dangers of Fiction, the weight of finding the door to Reality and the strain of dealing with the slightly mad Jak, Axel, for the moment, felt his only obligation was to watch Daxter curse bitterly at the cube.

However, peace rarely stretched long in Fiction, and soon, the quiet of the forest was intruded upon by a rush of voices. They came from the throats of avatars; who skirted the horizon, engaged in their various discussions as they hunted for roaming Originals. Axel and Daxter, their concentration captured by the cube, heard none of the avatar's chatter, and did not notice it until the distant mumbling sharpened to individual words and laughter.

"What's that? Looks like a hedgehog. Maybe Sonic's evil twin?" came a call. Axel stiffened, and Daxter packed his cube away with urgency. "I think they're talking about your 'do, buddy." he whispered. Axel was insulted, but he was much more concerned about his and Daxter's position. Now that he was paying attention, he could hear avatars churning in the woods around them. It was only because of a particularly large tree which Axel had leaned against that he had not been spotted before. However, Axel's large spikes of hair had betrayed his position, and now it seemed, their was nothing left for him to do but run.

Axel snatched a fistful of Daxter (he was not entirely sure which portion of the ottsel's anatomy he had grasped) and bolted. Female avatars shrieked, first with surprise, then with delight. "Oh! Axel! It's Axel!" "I'm your biggest fan!" "I less than three you, Flurry!"

Axel's face twisted into an expression of unparalleled disgust. "Oh great. How come chicks are always after you or Jak? No avatars ever chase me." grumped Daxter. Axel ignored the ottsel's whining and concentrated on running instead. Axel was quite fast; one of the fastest Originals in Fiction, and he put a great deal of distance between himself and the girls with only a few effortless strides. His heels tapped quick puffs of red dust into the air, like hazy exclamation marks, while his stride carried a smirking swagger all it's own. Though Axel was adapt at running, what he truly wished to demonstrate were his skills at combat. _These avatars...they're just kids, mostly. There would be such a gap in skill, I would almost feel bad for them. And after all, I only have Jak's word that these people are actually dangerous._ Thought Axel as he glanced over his shoulder to evaluate he pursuers. Indeed, they were mostly children.

_Then again..._Axel considered _these people seem to...know me...somehow. They knew both my names...if they knew to call me 'Flurry of the Dancing Flames', they must know about my fighting skills as well. Even so, these avatars aren't scared of me. They seem to think that I don't pose even the slightest threat to them. _Axel was also aware of the writhing weight of Daxter in his gloved hand. As far as he was concerned, Daxter would be a burden, slowing him down in combat. Gritting his teeth in recognition of he decision, Axel bowed his slender form close to the ground and ran with new speed.

From in-between Axel's fingers, Daxter called, "Hey! Don't forget to get Jak! We gotta warn him!" Axel nodded roughly in reply. Leaving Jak to the avatars would be like dumping an arachnephobic into a pit of spiders; it would be leaving the man to be destroyed by his worst fear. In spite of his rather heartless actions in his Media, even Axel wasn't that cruel.

Within minutes of beginning his little sprint, Axel saw Jak in the distance, who had mercifully, just put his pants on. "Hey! Jak-ass! We gotta go! There's about a hundred avatars coming this way!" snapped Axel. "Shit!" replied Jak, becoming noticeably paler as his gathered the remains of his clothes, as well as his unwieldy carbine. Snapping his gauntlets on his wrists, and throwing his leather bracers on over his bare skin, Jak stood and leapt across the stream. While doing so, he was still trying to tie his shirt around his waist. As Jak began to run, Axel came up behind him, matching his stride.

"Take your rat back!" growled Axel, offering Daxter up from a balled fist. As it turned out, Axel had grabbed Daxter around his midsection, and now the ottsel was whipping back and forth wildly...upside down. Jak stared fixedly at some distant point in the red woods, "...no, hang onto him. You're faster than me...if I fall behind, keep him with you." "Whatever." grunted Axel with ill temper. Far from being touched by this demonstration of brotherly affection, Axel was trying not to imagine what life would be like if he had to care for the rat. "I'd prefer if you kept up." Daxter told Jak, sounding a little queezy, probably from all the blood rushing to his head. "You and me both." added Axel under his breath. "Well, what can I say? You freak me out." said Daxter honestly. "That's no way to talk to your godparent." said Axel as he gave Daxter a little shake. "The avatars are gaining, by the way." he added. This was true. Jak was physically fit, but he simply wasn't a fast runner. "Damn it." he growled, "If I had my hoverboard, this wouldn't be an issue. We're coming up on the desert soon though. We'll probably lose them there. Avatars are pretty lazy. They won't go there if they don't absolutely have to."

Axel raised his eyes, staring ahead at a rapidly approaching red horizon. It seemed to swim against the ever present grey clouds and purple lightning. Then Axel realized what the red mass was, and he realized why the avatars turned from this place.


	8. Gristle

The ocean, when driven by wind or the secret movements of the earth, will arc in huge swells, thick with vengeful force. These waves carry their magnitude across the sea, and punish far-away shores with incessant, curling fury. The crimson on the horizon of Fiction which Axel was watching with disdain was fine red sand, but it was behaving like storm surge, beating against the old pines like sone strange gritty flood.

The forest did not weather this abuse quietly. Great swathes of offending sand were blown back, as though by some localized high wind, and among the churning dunes, treetops twisted and grew at astonishing rates, trying to keep their needley heads above the unruly Sahara.

"And...we're crossing that?" Axel asked, using Daxter to indicate the growing wall of sand and trees. Jak gave a short nod as he barreled forward, his heavy boots thumping tiredly against the hard ground. "Damn. You are insane." whistled Axel, but he continued ahead despite. "So is there are strategy to this, or are we gonna wing it?" asked Axel, masking his concern with a cocky smile. Jak examined the made boarder; judged it's distorted lines with an expert eye. "Okay, Today it looks like the sands are winning, so the idea is to get onto a tree and wait for the desert to overtake it. The goal is to get to the top of a tall tree, so you don't get buried or swept away." said Jak. Axel gave a nod, "I'll commit it to memory." then he stuffed Daxter in his hood. He would need both hands for climbing.

Finding a tall tree proved more difficult than anticipated. The ragged pines were generally short until very near to the raging sands, where they shot up to heights that were barely tall enough to sail above the sands. Axel observed as Jak veered to the left, his target tree already selected. Jak was an awkward runner, but with his long, burly arms, he was an expert climber. Axel found a tree which was almost as tall as Jak's, and pounced on it. Axel landed among some of the thinner branches near the top of the tree. Curling his slender form among the needles and weathered twigs, Axel transcended the final brush of needles and stood balanced on the topmost branches like some black and red raven.

From his new prospective, Axel could admire the nearly infinite expanse of forest behind him, and the similarly expansive dunes ahead of him. Fortunately, those waves were stagnet; only a small band of desert was violently animated. As Axel tried to find something besides desert under the grey sky ahead of him, Daxter cast a retrospective glance at the avatars, surging in mass below the pines. Their numbers were in the hundreds now, and they came with increasing speed, spurred by desperation. They did not want their prey to be swallowed by the desert.

Jak was atching the desert roll in. The first tendrils of sand were lapping at the bases of his and Axel's trees. After a few preliminary brushes by smaller waves of sand, the full fury of the boarder rocked the pines. The trees shivered as sand tore at their bark and roots, and Jak clung to the branches of his tree with white-knuckled fierceness. Even Axel, with his super-human sense of balance, found himself grasping a branch as a security measure. This turned out to be an excellent idea, as the worst of the waves had yet to come.

When Axel spied the first real wave, he thought it to be a phantasm; and illusion conjured before his disbelieving eyes. Sand seemed to break free from gravity's moorings in a single massive sheet, which then proceeded to hurtle with destructive intent at Axel. Jak cringed in anticipation of the sand's blow, but Axel stood, brazen and bold against the red grains which seemed to float above him. Then the sand slammed into Axel, with a rasping, harsh sound which swelled to a roar. The Sand broke over Axel's face, tearing his skin and rendering it raw in seconds. Axel clenched his eyes shut against the attack, feeling the rough grains inch between the folds in his cloak, as though searching for tender flesh do bite. His face was burning with pain; for Jak, whose entire upper body was exposed to the sand, the ordeal must have been torture. Axel felt weighted by the sand; dragged down by it's collective mass. Though currents of water have impressive force, the sand was much heavier than water, but it lashed out at Axel with liquid swiftness. It was as though something solid had simply taken the shape of Axel's body and slammed into him with un-natural force. For a few seconds, Axel was submerged beneath the sand, feeling the grains grate against his lips and eyelids. Then the hourglass tipped, and he was above the sand line again. Gulping a quick breath, Axel braced himself for another wav. The sand came with fresh agitation, sloshing Axel to an fro, nearly wrenching the tree from his grip. Daxter was faring even worse, literarily drowning in sand. Axel's hood had become filled to the brim with the gritty red stuff, and Daxter was curled up in the very base of the hood, the constant pressure of the waves preventing him from clawing his way up for breath...

And then the waves subsided; the warring boarder overtaking Axel and Jak's section of forest, and ravaging the next patch of forest. The sands had nearly overwhelmed the trees, rising until Jak and Axel were standing on what appeared to be thin branches poking from the once turbulent desert. Tentatively, Jak and Axel stepped onto the newly settled sand. As their feet collided with the grains, a heat wave rolled over the group, rocketing the temperature from the mild 70's to the unbearable 100's. Jak grimaced, his chest and back throughly flayed by the flying sands. As he shook sand from his salvaged shirt and slipped it gingerly over his tender hide he commented, "Welcome to the desert." Flipping his goggles over his face, and pulling his scarf up above his mouth, it appeared that Jak had come to Fiction equipped to battle desert climates. Axel glanced at the sky, which, in spite of the heat, was still overcast with its traditional spurts of purple lightning. "At least we can scorch in the shade." he commented. Axel wasn't actually roasting, since his element was fire, but he couldn't pass up the opportunity to make a joke.

Daxter, still sputtering from his near-drowning, leapt from Axel's hood to the hot sand, "Crazy weather is sort of a Fiction specialty. Get used to it." he muttered, climbing back on Jak's shoulder.

"Well Jak ass! That thing with the trees was an unusual display of tact. You should drink more often, if it give you bright ideas like that." said Axel with a little half smile. "Thanks Axehole. I'll keep that in mind." Jak replied, casually cleaning sand from his gun. _Touche_ thought Axel _Maybe there's hope for this guy after all._ Daxter, listening to the conversation with one ear, was occupied with getting sand out of his other.

"So, are we going to swing by the fan character village?" asked Axel. Jak stood with a grunt, hefting his gun over his raw shoulder. "Yeah. Hopefully we'll find the door to Reality there. Or at least some clue to it's location." Without a blinding desert sun to distract him from distance, Axel should see the rolls of red sand extending all the way to the far-removed horizon. Crossing his arms behind his head, Axel commented, "Damn. We've got quite a hike ahead of us then." with a little grin he added, "You guys should really build a highway or something."

Jak, his moment of humor passed, did not dignify that statement with a response. On his shoulder Daxter was already panting in the heat, "I hate deserts." he whined, "SERIOUSLY hate them. Didja know Jak and I nearly died in a desert once? True fact. Back in our Media I mean. That really sucked."

"Heh. Well, unless you want to do a little repeat performance of that event for me, we should get going." Axel laughed. Jak said nothing, but he took the first steps of the slow march.

So the trio began to wander across the vast new incarnation of Fiction, leaving their footprints in a dream-scape of shifting sands.


	9. gauntlet

Axel, Jak and Daxter had not been walking long when Axel spotted a glow pinched between the sky and the sand on the horizon. "What's that?" Axel questioned, "It can't be sunlight. Fiction's too grim for that." Jak glanced at the sky, "That's the 12 hour change of scenery. It affects the desert same as it does the forest, remember?" "Of course." scoffed Axel. Jak had yet to recognize Axel's obsession with memory.

The glow expanded from the pivotal point to consume the entire horizon. The light was an ethereal white, and seemed to be rushed across the desert in a veil which was draped from Heaven and brushed the sands below. The glow had a gentle, aurora-like quality; the sort of colors Axel through the afterlife should have. _It at least looks more comfortable than this stupid desert._ Thought Axel, who was itching in very uncomfortable places, thanks to the sand which had wormed it's way into his cloak. Jak did not seem to think quite as highly of the light, since he seemed to be slouching over against the approach of the light. Axel raised an eyebrow, watching Jak arch defensively. "Is it really that bad?" he asked.

Though Jak seemed to be attempting to make his body smaller, Jak's eyes getting large with fear, "No." he admitted, "It's what's after."

Before Axel could ask Jak to elaborate, the white light, which had been swiftly eating the expanse of desert, washed over him. For the instant when Axel was immersed in the light, everything seemed to stop and drop away. The sand below his feet was washed away, as were Jak and Daxter. Axel was suspended in the light, alone and silent. He had just enough time to think, _I've died again_ before the band of light continued it's rush onward, dumping him unceremoniously on the ground. Only Axel's catlike balance spared him the indignity of being dumped on his rear.

The inconsistent waves of sand had been replaced by a hard crust of red dirt, threaded by deep cracks. Occasional cacti rammed through the shell; huge fleshy saguaros which appeared to be holding their arms up in surrender. But it was not so much the cacti that captured Axel's attention as the two bus-sized scorpions which were now standing only a few yards ahead of the group. Most ordinary scorpions are tan or brown. These outsized monstrosities were black like new cars; sleek and reflective. The monsters sported huge gems on their foreheads, which Axel first took to be some kind of jewelry, until he noticed they had actually grown into the scorpion's skin. The gems were very unusual; highlighter yellow and opaque, with shots of yellow lightning crawling in their depths.

"Well, there's some unexpected company. Where they Hell did they come from?" asked Axel casually, as though he was discussing something trivial, like the weather. The giant scorpions clicked their engorged front claws with ill temper, and drawing close to the trio, who must have seemed very tasty in their buggy minds. "They must have been hiding under the dunes when they change came." replied Jak whipping out his carbine. Snapping their claws at a rapidly increasing tempo, the scorpions approached the group with malicious intent. Summoning his chakrams, Axel grinned, "I'll take the ugly one." he said, leaping at one of the scorpions.

As he sailed through the air, Axel heard the slight sounds of Jak's gun discharging behind him. Axel's scorpion did not seem concerned by the sounds, though with it's claws held open wide and its scythe-like tail held at the ready, it seemed very interested in Axel. With a swift movement which tested even Axel's ability to dodge, the scorpion thrust it's tail forward. Axel dodged left to avoid the blow, where he was met instantly by a crackling claw. Batting at the offending appendage with a chakram, Axel returned his concentration to the tail, which was back at the ready. The scorpion took aim and jabbed at Axel again, forcing him even closer to the claw.

Gritting his teeth, Axel called on his fires, setting his chakrams ablaze. Deflecting the claw with one chakram, Axel used the other chakram to pound the carapace of the claw. Despite the force of the strike, the chakram only created a chink small enough to trap on of it's spikes. Following through with the movement of his strike, Axel flipped over the scorpion's claw, using the chakram as an axis. Plucking the stuck chakram from the scorpion's shell, Axel dodged under the monster's stomach. Axel had hoped that there would be a soft spot on the scorpion's underbelly where he chakrams could effectively rend exposed flesh. _Or whatever giant bugs are made of._ Thought Axel as he jammed both chakrams into the shadow mass above him. The spines of his weapons were deflected by tough carapace. "Damn" he hissed, recoiling with pain. The attack had sent waves of pain through his slime wrists.

Above him, the black ceiling lurched backward. Apparently, the scorpion wanted Axel where it could see him...and strike him. Not wanting to re-enter the fight in front of the scorpion, where he could be pinched by giant claws and poked by a poisonous stinger at the same time, Axel ran forward, trying to outstrip the scorpion's movement. Axel would have preferred to pop out along side the scorpion and surprise it, however, the scorpion's legs were moving so quickly that they trapped Axel under the scorpion as effectively as a cage. Finally, Axel outran the scorpion, and for one not so glorious moment, he had a clear view of the scorpion's rear end, with the tail arching in the wrong direction to be a danger. The next instant however, the scorpion was turning, wheeling it's arsenal to face Axel. For a moment, Axel was puzzled as to how the creature had known where he was. _Vibrations_ he realized _When I move, it can feel it through the ground._ Not waiting for another attack, Axel summoned his fires again, "Hey, bug! Are you fireproof?" he asked, flinging a wall of flame at the creature. Though the scorpion flinched slightly, it did not turn from it's charge. "Guess so." said Axel. However, he sent another blaze hurtling at the scorpion. This time, he jumped after the flames, using them to mask his movement. The fires broke over the scorpion's hard back like a red wave, and soon afterward, Axel landed lightly one the still warm shell.

As soon as it felt Axel's landing on it's back, the scorpion brought it's tail down. Axel parried the strike with a chakram, and watched as the tail raised above him like the curling neck of a sea serpent, poised for another attack. Digging one of his chakrams into the scorpion's shell, Axel braced himself for the next attack. As the scorpion's tail descended on him again, Axel swung away from the sharp barb, again using his chakram as an axial. As the point of the tail glazed off the scorpion's own shell, Axel gave a triumphant "hunh!" and drove his free chakram between two segments of the tail. The chakram itself penetrated through half of the tissues and sinews which bound the tail to execute the scorpion's will. The chakram's fires took care of what remained. The severed tail rolled over Axel's back and onto the desert floor below.

The scorpion, apparently enraged by it's loss, began to buck and snap it's claws wildly. Using his chakrams as grappling hooks, Axel clung to the scorpion's shell. However, there was nothing for him to brace his feet against, so his body was flung around like a ribbon in the wind, occasionally impacting painfully with the hard carapace. Using one particularly large shake for momentum, Axel dislodged his chakrams and leapt into the air above the scorpion. Executing a mid-air flip, Axel re-oriented himself, so he was facing down at the scorpion's back.

Using tongues of flame, Axel softened his intended target, then angled his super-heated chakrams downward. Now Axel was plummeting headfirst toward the scorpion, gravity lending magnitude to his attack. A confident grin on his face, Axel struck the scorpion's back with all the force of fire behind him.

At first, it seemed as though the scorpion had shattered like glass, becoming nothing more than obsidian shards. From his unique perspective, Axel saw the event as it actually happened: the force of his attack had indeed splintered the shell of the scorpion, which was a painful but not fatal blow. The kill came when the heat of Axel's chakrams and his downward momentum burnt a whole through the center of the scorpion.

Emerging below the creature, Axel rolled away as quickly as possible. He had no desire to win the fight, only to be crushed by his enemy's still warm corpse. The scorpion staggered, tail-less and mortally wounded. It's legs scrabbled the tough desert floor, folding in on themselves even as the scorpion tired to wheel about and attack Axel again. Finally, the scorpion fell, clapping it's claws feebly, as though it was trying to ward off death. Flicking some scorpion innards from his sleeve, Axel turned away dispassionately as the scorpion gave one last shudder and died.

Jak was just finished up his scorpion, pumping more rounds into it's flinching frame. It appeared that 'strategically' placed bullets over every inch of the scorpion's body had finally done their office. Examining the scorpions from a distance, Axel realized that they were really very different from regular scorpions. They were stream lined, with their heads fused to their bodies in such a way that their elegant curvature was not interrupted. _Scorpions version 2.o_ thought Axel.

"Looks like you've got second place." said Axel, smirking as Jak walked over to him. Jak grunted, giving Axel grudging recognition. Axel sidled over, gloating in triumph. Kicking Jak's dead scorpion, he asked, "What's the story with these things? Originals or FC? Or are they native?" he asked.

Jak glared at the hulking carcasses, "Fan Characters, probably from a story about me. They are based off of creatures called Metalheads, which are native to my Media. But these are a lot bigger than they were back at home. Ordinarily, scorpion style Metalheads didn't get to be more than a foot or two long. Somebody probably thought it would be cute to have giant Metalheads chasing me in their story. A real grand concept."

Axel heard something fall behind. Thinking the Metalhead was not quite as dead as first anticipated, he spun around, chakrams at the ready. However, the noise was not a result of sudden reanimation, rather, the yellow gem had fallen from the Metalhead's forehead, leaving a wide black hole in the skull.

"You'll want that." said Jak, pointing at the gem, "They're pretty valuable. Particularly large ones. The rats will even trade manufactured goods for them." Axel walked over carefully, and snatched the gem, then darted away from the corpse as little faster than fearlessness allowed. He wasn't taking any chances with the creature, alive or dead. Jak was busily propping up the front of his Metalhead, and collecting the fallen gem from underneath.

Once he was at a comfortable distance from the scorpion, Axel began to examine the gem curiously. The thing was at least two feet long, and unusually light considering it's size. Lightning still danced in it's depths, giving off a faint glimmer. _Larxene would have loved this._ Thought Axel. The surface of the gem was cold and smooth, somewhat like glass, thought Axel had the impression it was much more durable then that. After a few more seconds of admiring the gem, Axel shrugged and dumped it to the ground.

"What the Hell?" Jak shouted, "Didn't you hear me? That thing is really valuable! Why are you throwing it away, dumbass?"

Axel's emerald eyes flared with annoyance. "A valuable pain in the ass! It's huge! How am I supposed to carry it around?" to Axel's surprise, Jak gave a condescending laugh of amusement. "Guess I'll have to carry it for you." he said, digging for something in a pouch clipped to his belt. The item he sought turned out to be a small bag, made out of a strange, light leather with a pattern suspiciously similar to the wrinkles of human skin.

Jak pried the little bag ope; it's mouth seemed to stretch beyond it's reasonable physical limits. In a grotesque distortion of space, Jak shoved his entire Metalhead gem into the tiny, shallow bag. "Here, give me yours. I'll hold on to it for you." he said.

Axel's eye brows jumped into twin arcs of surprise. "What is that thing, anyway?" he asked, indicating the bag.

"I got it off of some dead wizard. You can fit pretty much anything in there. Probably the most valuable thing I've found in Fiction so far. The rats would sell the skin off their backs to get this."

Eying the bag with suspicion, Axel edged towards it, poking it with his Metalhead gem. Carefully, he slipped the gem into the bag's black depths, and was surprised to see that, true to Jak's claim, the entire thing fit.

After the gems were safely stored in the bag, Jak closed it and carefully slipped it into his pouch. "Pretty handy." he commented.

Axel thought it was just plain creepy.


	10. Glib

Axel thought that after Jak had retrieved the gem, he would be finished with the hulking dead scorpion. _These things are starting to creep me out._ It might have been Axel's imagination, but the filtered light which drizzled through the ever present clouds seemed to grow lower, as though some celestial dimmer switch was being turned very slowly. The shadows around the scorpions grew deeper, and the corpses were beginning to look more like grotesque monuments rather than dead bugs. Axel wasn't one to become paranoid, but he sensed that something very bad was happening.

Suddenly, in what appeared to be a spontaneous, violent need to desecrate corpses, Jak began pumping rounds into a dead scorpion's claw. Axel didn't jump, but he was mildly curious as to why Jak would waste bullets on something that was already very dead.

Jak kicked the scorpion's claw, widening a crack made in the shell by the bullets. Kneeling down, he pried the claw open, peering intently at the dark insides of the carapace. After the rift was wide enough, Jak stuck his entire hand into the claw, prodding it's dark insides.

"Excuse me, but what the Hell are you doing?' asked Axel, somewhat disgusted.

"Seeing how much meat is in this thing. Loads by the feel of it." Jak sighed, stepping away from the claw. "Doesn't do us much good without wood. We'd need a fire to cook it."

Axel gave a short laugh, "You can't be serious! If I didn't know better, I'd say you'd been blindfolded this entire trip. Jak, you have honestly wounded my pride."

"What are you talking about?" said Jak suspiciously, he eyebrows mirroring the concern in his voice.

"Come on Jak. Where I am, there's fire." said Axel, shrugging and spreading his long arms. With a brief burst of flame, Axel called one of his chakrams, twirling it casually in his hand.

Jak stepped back and Daxter winced in fright. They both thought that Axel had suddenly turned on them.

However, Axel merely laid the chakram on the sand, and snapped his fingers at it. The weapon burst into flames which were as concentrated and intense as those on a range. "You can use it on the condition that you keep this memorized: I am fire." he said in a superior tone, touched with humor.

Within a minute after Axel's display, Jak had arranged the claw so it was cooking over the fire. Though the scorpion meat smelled edible, Axel glad he wouldn't have to eat it. Reclining in the sand, he watched as Jak sat down stiffly and slowly. "If you're always so stressed out, your gonna end up with an ulcer. And good luck finding a doctor in this wasteland." Axel said with a wave of his hand.

Jak simply glared at Axel from across the fire. "It pays to be on the look out here." he said simply.

Axel decided to pursue another topic of conversation. "So, how'd you get here? You didn't die right?" he asked, leisurely playing with flames which had sprouted from his fingertips.

"Daxter and I used Precursor technology to open a rift gate. We just went through and ended up here." Jak explained tersely.

"Precursor? What's that? Sounds fancy." asked Axel, mildly curious. Generally Axel was only interested in things that were of immediate value to his survival, but Precursor's sounded so bizarre he couldn't resist learning more.

"Why, a Precursor is me, of course!" said Daxter cheerily, as he struck a few poses which Axel assumed were crude attempts to look 'macho'.

"You might wanna invest some Munny in a personal training program." Axel said, unimpressed by Daxters non existent muscles. Turning to Jak, Axel said, "There's no way a bunch of squirrel-rats like him could build something complex enough to rip a hole from a Media to Fiction." Axel jerked a lanky arm and pointed at Daxter with his thumb. "He's and idiot." Daxter flicked Axel off behind his back, and was rewarded for this action when a shower of sparks leapt from the campfire/chakram and singed his fur.

Jak sighed, "Well Daxter couldn't do it, but apparently the rest of his race is pretty bright. But then again, Daxter isn't a Precursor by birth, but you know that. Anyway, before my race was building anything more complicated than stick and mud dwellings, the Precursors came and 'blessed' us with all kinds of advanced technology. Their shrines and architecture linger all over my world. The Precursors used life force, or Eco as they called it back home, to manipulate their inventions. I happen to have a special affinity for Eco, so I could use their stuff, too."

"So, you found and old Precursor gate opened it." finished Axel. "Did you just bring your rat with you? I know if I were traveling to some freakish alternate dimension, I'd bring someone much more...useful. Or at least and overnight pack and a sleeping bag."

Daxter began making frantic gestures, drawing his finger across his neck and shaking his head vigorously.

"Sore subject?" asked Axel with a grin, pointing at Daxter. "I know I would regret not bringing an air mattress too, if I had the opportunity to do so."

"Shut up!" growled Jak, getting to his feet, "Shut the Hell up! You don't know a thing! Not a fucking thing!" with that, Jak paced out into the desert, and was quickly lost from sight.

_Well, that was unexpected. _Thought Axel. Jak was paranoid, but Axel hadn't pinned him for a manic depressant. Schizophrenic. _Something in that neighborhood. _He thought. When Jak was out of earshot, Axel shrugged and turned back to Daxter, "He must really regret not having that sleeping bag."

Daxter plopped down onto the hard dirt and poked at the cavernous cracks in the soil with a piece of scorpion shell. "Its not the sleeping bag. It's that...we didn't come alone. There were three babes that came with us. Tess was one of 'em. Back in our Media, she got turned into an ottsel, like me. Damn, she was hot! It takes a special kinda women to be that hot even when she's covered in fur. And she had these huge..."

Axel rolled his eyes. Female rodents were simply not appealing to him.

Daxter gave a little cough to recover his composure and continued, "And there was also Keira and Ashelin. Keira knew Jak for a long time; since his was just a wide eyed scrawny mute galloping across the plains of our Media. Then there was Ashelin. She was hot stuff too. And a clever KG officer and the daughter of the head hancho of Haven City to boot. 'Course her daddy kept trying to kill Jak and me off but..." Daxter trailed off, lost in he memories of the lovely ladies of his past. More specifically, their impressive curves and 'smokin' looks.

"Is there a point to this or are you simply demonstrating how your memory lane runs past Playboy Manor?" asked Axel, though he was not completely adverse to contemplating the looks of the women Daxter had just described.

"I'm getting to the point! Don't rush me!" snapped Daxter, "Anyway, Jak, Tess, Keira, Ashelin and myself all came through the portal to Fiction together. The first couple of days were swell. Not perfect, but ya know. Bearable. Then...we were ambushed. It was out of nowhere. Avatars just snatched Tess and Keira...there was nothing we coulda done for them. Ashelin, Jak and I ran for it, but these Fan Characters...well we didn't know what they were then of course, jumped Ashelin and tried to hold her down until the Avatars could catch up. They were right on our tail...gosh you could HEAR them! Jak was gonna start fighting when Ashelin told him to run off and hide. Well Jak you know..he's all honor...y...and stuff so he wasn't gonna hear that. But Ashelin, she took out her standard issue KG pistol from her leg brace and held it at her temple, saying she would blow her brains out if Jak and I didn't run...it was intense man. Jak was nearly in tears...Ashelin too, actually, but in the end Jak ran..."

"A few days later, we heard some noise in the woods. Jak, he wanted to investigate. Turns out it was a huge gathering of male Avatars. They were all laughing and jeering...but Jak and I couldn't see what they were looking at, so Jak climbed a tree real silent like to get a peek. From the top, we could look down at the center of the circle of Avatars. That's where Tess, Ashelin and Kiera were. Tess was human again, and all three were naked. They were...well...having a threesome. Guys around the circle were cheering them on, and calling out different positions they wanted to see the girls in. And Tess, Keira and Ashelin did exactly what they asked. That's after we learned that Avatars got control of you if they caught you, so at least we knew what was going on. Jak wanted to leave, but the crowd had gotten too large and we couldn't get down from the tree safely. We were up in that tree for hours...you could hear the girls the whole time. Eventually, the male Avatars started taking turns...'doing it' with the girls. That's when Jak learned you can't hurt Avatars unless they've violated copyright laws. Jak got a few rounds off before we ran for it, but the bullets bounced right off the Avatars." Daxter shook his head, as though trying to clear the awful images from his mind.

"How do know that Tess and them didn't just agree to do all that sexual stuff to save themselves? I mean, they were hostages, right?" asked Axel, ever the skeptic.

Daxter looked up, staring into Axel's sharp, green eyes with a haunted expression. Axel was surprised to see the ordinarily breezy ottsel so...traumatized. "If you were there...you would have known. It wasn't an act. And like I said, by then we knew what Avatars did to you when they caught you."

Standing up slowly, Daxter peered out into the desert, "I better go get Jak. If we just let 'im wander, who know's where he'll end up. He gets turned around when he's cranky." Daxter left the illuminated circle of earth around the fire to follow Jak's footsteps into the gloomy desert.


	11. Greisen

As soon as Daxter was out of sight, Axel was surprised by a voice behind him. "Ah. Alone at last. Hello Axel."

Axel summoned his other chakram to his hand, and spun around with surprising swiftness, considering that moments before, he had been reclining in relative comfort on the desert floor. Facing the speaker, Axel saw the voice had come from an old man, wearing shabby robes and a ridiculously tall pointed hat. Both the robe and the hat bore a pattern of silver stars and moons, which seemed to glitter, even though there was no source of light bright enough to make them do so. The man had a long white beard, and an astoundingly large and crocked nose. On the man's shoulder, a large and ancient looking bird observed the scene like a feathered pterodactyl.

The man, though harmless in appearance, was nothing short of a menace in Axel's eyes. First of all, he had surprised Axel, a difficult feat indeed, since Axel's senses were far more acute than any human's. Secondly, the man had known Axel's name, even though he had neither the traits or aura of an ordinary Avatar. It was uncanny, and it hinted at powers which more than compensated for the man's feebleness which came with old age.

"I'm not here to harm you." said the old man in a friendly, calm sounding voice. For a moment, Axel was compelled to lower his weapon and to simply talk to the man, but he overcame the impulse and bowed further into attack position, "Like Hell you aren't. Generally well meaning folk don't sneak up on people. So are you gonna tell me why you're here or am I gonna need to roast you,"

The old man smiled kindly, "I don't think that will be needed, but even if it was, I am less flammable than I appear, sorry to say. Believe it or not, I'm here to help you, Axel."

Axel snorted, "Is that so? Well, I'm doing fine on my own thanks. You can just be on your way."

"You should be glad your death wasn't final Axel. I don't think you realize how lucky you are that you have a chance to pass through Media and Reality before going to the true afterlife for judgement." the older man said, suddenly stern.

Axel was briefly stunned, "What?" he asked, struck by the man's change in tone (and subject).

"You left your Media expecting to be rewarded for the good turn you did Sora. But one good act is not enough to make up for the evils you have committed in the past. To redeem yourself of those deeds, you require a change of attitude as well as a change of action, though admittedly sacrificing yourself was an excellent start. It pushed you over the line from evil to neutral." the old man mused, the bird on his shoulder cawing for emphasis.

"Who the Hell are you, you old fart?" demanded Axel, "What are you talking about?"

Bowing, the man tipped his pointed hat, "Forgive me. In my old age, I seem to have forgotten how these social meeting are supposed to go. My name is Dumbledore. I'm an Original such as yourself, though I am from a different Media and have been in Fiction considerably longer than you have. As for what I'm talking about...well that should seem obvious. You've been quite self serving in the past, sacrificing other's lives to protect your own, double crossing those who have held you in confidence. Before you sacrificed yourself on Sora's behalf, you had done nothing to benefit others or inconvenience yourself." the man said, frowning.

"How do you know that! I haven't told anyone about what happened in Castle Oblivion!" demanded Axel. He very much disliked Dumbledore, and was becoming increasingly worried about the sort of powers he possessed.

"I know these things.." explained Dumbledore, watching Axel with bright blue eyes, "because I studied the art of 'mind reading', as some crudely put it, when I was still in my Media. For ordinary Originals and Fan Characters, I can sense what they are feeling, and only sometimes what they are thinking. Their hearts are too complex for even me to interpret fully. However, since you lack a heart, you're memories and thoughts are bare and are easy to access...and assess."

Axel stared at the ground. Unfortunately, Dumbledore seemed telling the truth about his mind reading skills. "I'm really getting sick of you" muttered Axel. He desperately wanted to make a smoking pile of ash out of the old man, but if the old man could read Axel's mind, he could also predict Axel's movements. Parrying Axel's attacks would be child's play if he knew they were coming. Unable to violently wipe Dumbledore from the face of Fiction, Axel decided that playing along with the old man's craziness was the best option. _He'll leave quicker if I cooperate._ Axel reasoned.

"What are you telling me this? Why do you care about what I've done in the past? It's none of your business anyway." said Axel gruffly, stepping out of attack stance, but still holding on to his chakram.

"Why indeed." said Dumbledore as though he was thinking out loud, "I suppose it's the teacher in me. In my Media, I was concerned for my student's education and safety. I did everything to help them. I suppose I impulsively reach out to those in need of guidance."

"Look, in case you haven't noticed, I'm a grown man. I don't need guidance." Axel said, somewhat offended.

Dumbledore raised his eyebrows in a very Axel-like way, "Don't you? What's your plan for redemption then? You do realize that if you get to Media, you will also get a soul? Or a heart as you call it? Do you want that soul to start of tainted by sins from you past?" asked Dumbledore.

Axel sighed, "What are you, some kinda preacher? Look, frankly, I don't give a damn what condition my heart or soul or whatever is in when I get it. Just so long as I get one."

"Well, in case you should begin to care, I have this advice to offer: you have two main opportunities for redemption on Fiction. One is learning the virtue of respect. If you treat Jak in a more kindly fashion, that will certainly put you on the right track."

"What the Hell? Sensitivity training? Look, have you met Jak? He's insane. How am I supposed to respect that?" demanded Axel.

"I have met Jak, and I assure you, he has retained plenty of sanity, despite the horrible things he has witnessed. Have you forgotten the tale Daxter just told you?" Dumbledore pointed out.

Axel blinked, "That was true? I thought that maybe Daxter was just making that up.."

Dumbledore shook his head, "That story was perfectly true, but it is not the focus of our discussion. The other virtue you might be able to master in Fiction is love."

Chortling, Axel said, "I thought you knew what I was. Buddy, I'm a Nobody. I can't feel anything. Not remorse, not hate and particularly not love. Hell, I can't even remember what it's like to love, seeing as I didn't fall in love before I died the first time. Sure I broke plenty of hearts, but nobody got around to charming mine. When I had one."

Dumbledore smiled sadly, "I feel much pity for you. Though it is true that you can not actually remember love while in Fiction, or experience it for the first time, you can lay the groundworks of true love while you remain here, and then carry those feelings over to Reality, where they will be fleshed out and made real when you get a soul."

"If you think something is going on between Jak and me, you have no idea how wrong you are. That joke is really getting old." Axel complained.

Dumbledore chuckled, "No, I'm not suggesting that you have romantic interest in Jak. However, somebody will come along who just might bring out some of your long forgotten memories of affection. I suggest you simply let it happen. You can be quite stubborn if something is impeding your progress, so much so that you would rather discard whatever is hindering you, rather than work to carry it with you. Love can be a challenge, but don't abandon it if it is inconvenient to your immediate cause."

Axel scowled, "I. Can't. Love. Get it memorized! And look, I really don't feel like taking relationship advice from some random old guy who just happens to pop up at my campsite. If I meet somebody I'm gonna make my own choices, not just force myself to like them to save my soul. Heart. Whatever." Axel thought about what he had just said. "All this happy sappy feelings talk is really getting on my nerves. It isn't really my thing. Just get out of here. The whole conversation reeks of gay."

Dumbledore chuckled, "Never politically correct, are you? Considering that your most popular pairing is with a Roxas, I can't blame you for wanting to assert your masculinity. Well, if you are so opposed to my help, I'll leave you. Keep in mind what I said." And with that Dumbledore turned and walked off into the desert, whistling cheerily.

Axel watched him go, looking quite disgusted, "Me and Roxas? What the Hell!" he finally said, sputtering, "I'm no pedofile! I'm not gonna let you get away with that little comment!" said Axel. But Dumbledore was long gone.

"Why the Hell are you talking to?" asked Jak. He had drifted out of the desert(Daxter perched loyally on his shoulder, as if nothing had ever happened) just as Dumbledore was fading into the distance. To him, it seemed that Axel had lost his mind and had suddenly taken to shouting random phrases into empty air.

Axel spun around, a look of great displeasure on his face, "Some dumbass named Dumbledore was here. You just missed him. The bastard."

Jak gaped, "Seriously? Dumbledore was here? Where'd he go? I've been hoping to talk to him again." Jak scanned the horizon eagerly, but the old man was long gone.

Axel sat down on the hard desert floor, his lanky form splayed across the ground, "Hmm? You actually wanna talk to that jerk?" he asked.

Nodding eagerly, Jak said, "Yeah. He really helped me out. He told me all about how Fiction relates to Media and Reality, and how Avatars can control you if they catch you. Important stuff like that."

"He told you that?" Axel gave a short laugh and grinned, "All he did for me was give me a lecture. Bastard."

Jak narrowed his eyes, "What the Hell did you do to get on his bad side? Dumbledore must have been the most mellow person I've met here. Normally Fiction does stuff to Originals. Makes them mean and really self centered. He wasn't like that at all though."

Axel rolled his eyes, "If you like him so much, you can keep him. Go marry him while you're at it. That would be some pretty sweet revenge for me."

"There something you not telling me Jak?" Daxter asked, rapping on Jak's skull, "Cause if you don't want the ladies, I'll take them."

"Shut up." barked Jak, "That is too foul to even comprehend." Sitting down in front of the scorpion claw, Jak poked one finger into the hole in the shell, "Feels about done." he commented, pulling the severed appendage off the flames.

With a lazy wave of his hand, Axel retracted his chakram. Eyeing the greenish scorpion meat Jak was exhuming from the claw in fistfuls, Axel said, "You are seriously gonna eat that, aren't you."

Jak took a big bite of the meat and nodded. Daxter followed suit, stuffing fistfuls of Metalhead flesh in his mouth.

"I wouldn't." said Axel as he stared at the grey sky. It certainly seemed darker, with the purple bands of lightning more pronounced across the slate-like face of the clouds. There was an odd coldness about there giant Metalhead corpses that was familiar to Axel, but utterly untraceable.

Jak followed Axel's gaze skyward and said through a mouthful of food, "Looks darker, right?" asked Jak, indicating the sky.

"Seems to be." said Axel, waving a head, "Lemmie guess. There's some kind of horrific event loaming on the horizon which would almost certainly kill us if you did not possess the amount of hard earned knowledge of this forsaken place that you do, Jak."

Jak looked surprised, and rather foolish, with his cheeks filled with food, "Yeah, actually. Good guess."

Axel shook his head and sighed, "In this place, it isn't hard. Anyway, what's coming to send us to an early grave now?"

"A storm. Fiction doesn't have sunlight, but it has some wild weather. Mostly fierce thunderstorms. In the desert, we have to worry about flash floods. And lightning." said Jak, finishing up another fistful of meat. "The storms normally take a few days to fully develop. We'll want to be at the fan character village by then. They've got the high grounds in these parts."

Axel examined the weather. There was more menace in those clouds then simple thunder and lightning. "Can these storms be summoned?" Axel asked, "By 'magic' or something?"

The last of the meat depleted, Jak stood and glanced at the sky, "Probably. It is Fiction after all." Examining the horizon, Axel pointed to something in the far flung distance. "Luckily, we're not far from the fan character village, which in unusual, because the desert is usually larger. Much larger."

Axel squinted to examine the small blemish between the sand and sky; a tiny dot which appeared to be balanced at the end of Jak's finger. "That's a hike." he commented.

"Darn right it is! So you two better get walking, 'cause there ain't no way I'm getting stuck in the rain!" said Daxter as he licked his fingers, slurping up every last drop of scorpion juices. "I mean, ultimately it benefits the both 'a you to keep me dry. You ever smelled wet ottsel?"

Jak wrinkled his nose, "Right. Well, let's get moving."

Axel, Jak and Daxter turned their backs on their campsite and began approaching the darkening sky that hovered at the edge of the world. Alone in the desert, the dead scorpions stood like gloomy monuments marking the passing of some grim history. When the next world change came, their bodies would be buffeted, buried and lost to time, until some fresh change churned the sand and brought the exoskeletons to the surface again.

Under the arching corpses, a large dark portal spun into being, blossoming black against the red sand. A dark cloaked figure stepped from the shadows, and examined the dead creatures. The figure then focused on the retreating trio; watched them as they diminished with distance. Silent, the figure considered what Fan Character would be powerful enough to kill the group. The Metalheads had not done as well at the job as expected.

Discontented, the black cloaked figure stepped back into his portal and disappeared.


	12. Ghost

Jak, Axel and Daxter made it to the fan character village before the next 'change in setting' as Jak called it. Considering the distance and the heat, Axel was surprised they had made it to the village in under 12 hours. _Then again, I'm no wimp and I guess Jak isn't a pansy either._ Axel considered. Daxter was another story altogether. He wined, winced and was generally a nuisance. Eventually even Jak got annoyed with him, and threatened to leave him in the desert if he didn't shut up. This remark only elicited even more complaints from the rodent.

As the trio approached the village, Jak swung off to the right, heading towards a wooded hill overlooking the town. It looked extremely out of place; a lush grove of trees on a mound in an otherwise flat desert.

"How come that hill didn't change?" asked Axel, "I mean, when that white curtain came."

"The Fan Character village and that hill are located on fixed ground. It's rare stuff in Fiction. Basically, that's ground that stays the same during the 12 hour changes. That's the only reason they can build on it. Structures on ground that isn't fixed get really messed up when the terrain changes. Anyway, patches of fixed ground are hot property. Tribes of Fan Characters are always fighting to acquire them. Plus, those groups that do have the land have to be very choosy about who they let live there, since there is a limited amount of space for people. It's not uncommon for villages like this one to have a sort of entrance exam for perspective members. Normally it's something rough."

Jak and Axel mounted the hill, keeping under the cover of the trees. Daxter was unusually silent. Perhaps he was afraid of being caught by any Fan Character who might be guarding thing woods.

Jak's voice lowered to a whisper, "Normally, they have a sentry or two in these woods, but since a storm is coming, I am willing to bet that a pretty big effort is being made to weather-proof the homes down below. We can get a good look at the town. Maybe even spot the door to Reality."

"What's the door look like?" Axel asked, curiously. He would at least like to know what he was looking for.

"Donno. It should have Fan Characters coming out of it though, in a nearly constant stream. They're a heck of a lot of them in Fiction, though most of them live in places more hospitable than the desert." Jak said, wrinkling his nose in dislike.

Axel crested the hill, eager to catch a glimpse of the door that could get him a heart, however as he looked down at the town, he was distracted by the inhabitants. Some were normally proportioned and humanoid, familiar-type beings, but not many. His first impression was that the Fan Characters must be made of some strange, pliable material, which twisted them into freakish parodies of their original shapes. The Fan Characters hobbling along below had oversized heads, long dragging arms or stilt like legs. They were frighteningly skinny, morbidly obese, or simply facially malformed.

"What the Hell happened to them?" asked Axel, surprised, "They look like someone put them through a blender!"

Jak looked at Axel curiously, then a look of understanding fluttered behind his eyes, "Oh right! You've never seen fan characters. Well, in Fiction, their looks depend on how well their personalities were developed in their stories. If a fan character was well written, with a realistic balance of happiness, sadness, likes and dislikes, they come to Fiction looking pretty much normal. But if something is off, or they are underdeveloped in any way, they end up ugly."

Axel considered this as he scanned the masses. The hill was actually quite low, and he could only see a small portion of the city. As he watched the movements of the fan characters, he noticed there were some that were generally human shaped, but they were also opaque.

"What's with the transparent ones?" Axel asked, pointing one out.

"That's what happens when and author models a fan character after themselves. There can't be two people with the same personality, so the fan character is basically the sum of the differences between it and the author. The greater the similarities between the fan character and the author, the paler the fan character is." Jak explained.

Axel watched their movements in silence. The fan characters didn't seem particularly concerned that they were warped or twisted; the ugly, the ghostlike and they mingled with their ordinary looking neighbors confidently. Perhaps it was the impending storm that drove them into co-operation.

"I don't see any doors Jak." reported Daxter. "'Cept the little ones in front of the buildings. Oh and that looks like on in front of a shop...and that, I believe is a post office." Daxter said, squinting.

Axel assumed that Daxter had been here before, and knew what the buildings were only because of years study. Axel could not tell what the function of most of the buildings was, but it seemed they were crude recreations of the fan character's native architecture. Though the buildings were interesting to look at, they looked very rickety. Apparently, nobody made up fan characters who were carpenters.

"I bet..." Jak thought out loud, "We can get closer."

"Now, why would we want to do that?" asked Daxter, making a face.

"To see more of the village. The door could be hidden after all." Jak pointed out. "There's a palmetto field on the other side of the village. We can sneak through there and get a good look at what they are up to."

"They won't notice us?" asked Axel, skeptically.

"'Course not. They're all der der deeer." explained Daxter, imitating comedian Carlos Mencia.

Before Axel could question the validity of Daxter's statement, Jak had darted off into the woods. Reluctantly, Axel followed. The fan characters certainly hadn't looked stupid.

------------------------------------------

Minutes later, Jak, Daxter and Axel were hunched among the sharp fingers of the palmetto leaves. The plants, which bordered on the desert were dusty, and stained with various shades of grit and sand. Trying not to brush the dry plants, Axel slunk like a cat through the tangle of thorny stems. A slow breeze began to stir the fronds causing the leaves hissing unpleasantly as they slid against each other.

Slipping like a ragged shadow among the hostile plants, Axel took pride his stealth. He thought that he had been as undetectable as a secret, that is, until he felt the touch of cold metal at the back of his neck.

"Stand." came a command in dull monotone. Surprisingly, the voice sounded feminine.

Axel didn't respond immediately; he wasn't one to follow commands. In response, the tip of a weapon dug into his neck, drawing a thin trickle of blood.

"I'll sever your spinal chord if you don't stand." said the flat voice.

Gritting his teeth, Axel stood slowly and grudgingly, his hands clenched at his sides. He felt the tip of the blade withdraw from his neck.

"Turn around." the voice demanded, though there was not conviction behind it.

Axel turned around since he knew his attacker had a weapon, but his eyes glinted with anger at being caged. _Fuck._ He thought eloquently, wondering who he was up against. _How the Hell did she even catch me?_

However, when he finally faced the one who wielded the weapon, his rage was displaced by surprise. The women holding Axel hostage was wearing a black Organization cloak, nearly identical to his own, though her clung much tighter to her slim figure.

The women had and exotic, amazonian air; slight but mean. She had short, cropped hair, with long bangs which dangled in front of her eyes. Her hair was cut economically, so it was longest in the front where the uneven strands tickled her jawline, and without experience. Axel was certain she had done the job herself, with a tool much more crude than scissors. The color of her hair was an odd cocktail of rose madder, red, orange and mahogany, and strangely, her eyes were the exact same hue. The woman's face seemed to have Asian features to it, with sharp edged eyes that sported dark, swooping lashes. Two tattoos, similar to Axel's own, dropped from beneath her eyes like running makeup. These tattoos curled toward her nose at the tip, creating an upside-down Halloween Hills beneath her eyes.Though she certainly had beautiful features, her face was made ugly by the flat, glassyness of her eyes. The fog which cause her voice to fall from her lips without inflection seemed to have sunk into her very being and showed through her eyes.

For her weapon, she hefted a large grisarme, which was similar to a battle axe, except the duel blades were positioned on top of a staff which was as longer as she was tall. The gisarme- head was stylized, looking more like dragon wings than ordinary axe blades. The axe its self was colored in rose madder, purples and silvers, with a larger Nobody symbol crawling along the staff and protruding past the edge of the blades. The topmost point of the Nobody symbol had been sharpened to a spear point, and judging by the reddish discoloration on its edge, it had just been removed from the edge of Axel's neck.

As her dead eyes slid methodically across Axel's face, a spark of recognition seemed to rise behind them. For a moment, the women seemed more real; more alive. Her face shifted from it's expression of drab indifference to one of surprise. Then the look died, and she returned to her zombie-like state.

"What is you're business here?" she asked, pointing her gisarme at Axel's chest, holding it horizontally as though it weighed nothing at all.

"Looking for a door to Reality. Is that like, illegal or something?" asked Axel, sarcastically.

"No, but sneaking into another fan character's village is frowned upon. If your intentions were peaceful, you would not have been creeping." she charged.

"I donno. My partner seemed to think it was a good idea to sneak around. Honestly, I don't know why he thought that. I'm new here. Fresh out of Media. I don't know the local taboos. If you let me on my way, it'll be like I was never even here." _because I would hate to have to burn your pretty face for hassling me._ Thought Axel fiercely. Then another thought hit him _Where the Hell is Jak? Bastard. Just dumped me here to deal with her. Well, not that I wouldn't do the same to him, but it still ticks me off._ He fumed.

Axel watched as the women's expression shifted to disbelief. "You're an...Original?" she asked.

"Well..yeah. And you're a fan character, right?" said Axel, wishing he knew why her face was displacing a look of vague indifference with one of horror.

"Show me your tattoo." she demanded, pointing her gisarme at Axel again. Complying because of the weapon, Axel pulled back his sleeve and revealed the circle-C that branded him as and Original.

"Then you can't stay here." the women stated plainly, "Some Avatars are coming soon, to take their fan characters back so they can write sequels with them. The Avatars will be here momentarily. If you don't want to end up as their plaything, follow me."

When the women began walking further into the dusky palmetto forest, he asked her to wait a moment. Then he turned around and hissed into the silence around him, "Jak, you hear that? Follow her?" then, without waiting for the other man to show himself, Axel followed the fan character.

Soon, he heard a rustling behind him, and Jak appeared at Axel's side.

"Bastard." Axel said in a low and surly whisper. "How long were you planning on letting her hold me hostage."

"Until I got a clean shot at her chest. If you had moved a little one way or the other, I could have gotten her. And why are you going with her anyway? We can do better on our own." Jak said.

Axel gave Jak a sidelong glance, "How? She knows where we can hide."

"We can do fine on our own. We're Originals. And how do you know this isn't a trap?" Jak asked roughly.

Ignoring the question, Axel focused on Jak's claim of superiority. "Being Originals doesn't give us shit."

"She's just a fan character." said Jak angrily. "And did you hear me? She might be leading us into a trap! You know fan characters sometimes do business with Avatars? They trade them Originals for manufactured goods."

Axel sighed, "Look, enough with the trap business. You can really get tiresome, you know? If this village did that kind of thing, don't you think we would have seen some evidence of the Original trade in the town when we looked at it? Some cages or something? But we didn't. Avatars aren't gonna sit in one town all day waiting for their favorite character to maybe show up. Use your head Jak, hard as that may be with that tiny brain of yours. Anyway, she lives here. I think she knows more about good hiding places than we do." Axel explained, shaking his head. "It's and icky situation, but I think she is actually trying to help us out."

Jak sighed, as though Axel was an ignorant child who was slow at understanding read life. "Look, we were made up by paid professionals; we had whole games to develop our personalities. Fan characters were made up by zitty kids with computers. I mean, to put it bluntly, they just aren't as good as us. We don't need their help."

Axel stopped, examined Jak's expression and shook his head. "You just don't get it do you? If you wanna get caught be Avatars, fine with me. You and your rat can leave and never come back for all I care. But I'm going with her." Axel pointed at the fan character and then left to follow her.

Jak hesitated, then followed Axel and the fan character anyway, even while Daxter quickly voiced his annoyance with the choice. However, Jak's fear of Avatars was greater than his disrespect for fan characters and he silenced Daxter's complaints with a quick punch.

The palmetto forest eventually terminated into the dirty town which Axel had seen from the hill. As Axel, Jak and Daxter passed them, the disfigured fan characters fell into a disturbed silence, their eyes filled with distrust of the new comers. Clearly the female fan character who served as their escort was well respected by the grotesques that inhabited the town. Many of them nodded to her as she passed, or even bowed as if she was some exulted figure. Curious whispers sprung up like weeds in the wake of Jak and Axel's passing. Daxter did not generate too much excitement. Most fan characters figured he was some sort of food offering to win the respect fo their leader.

The main street of the village traveled in a relatively straight line toward a large shack positioned on a man made berm at the center of town. Twisting sides streets, filled with gloom and garbage, slunk away from the main road to all sorts of unsavory destinations.

As Axel mounted the hill, he realized that there was not one main road but four, with the large shack serving as the hub of the town.

"You live here?" asked Axel, indicating the rickety building.

The women nodded, opening the thin door. After ushering Axel and Jak into her home, the Fan Character hurriedly followed them inside and closed the door behind her. Her home was dark, with greasy windows and occasional candles to contrast the shadows. Renderings of various Fan Characters, wrought on tanned animal hides, glared down at Axel with grim eyes.

"Stay here. Stay away from the windows." cautioned the lady fan character.

"Not that it would matter." snorted Jak, "They're really dirty."

The Fan Character did not take Jak's rude comment personally. Instead, she simply explained, "I have more important things to concern me than petty things such as windows. Clean windows are for Reality."

She made her way to the door, but before she touched the handle, Axel interrupted her with a question. "You have a name?" he asked casually.

When the fan character turned around, Axel was surprised to see a look of deep sadness on her face. Not screaming, loud anguish, but something deeper and more subtle. Sorrow.

"My name is Xeros." she said quietly. Then she turned on her heel slipped out the door.


	13. Guard

"What was that all about?" asked Daxter, referring to Xeros's reaction. He had flopped casually on a chair, his orange fur meshing with the pelt that served as a cushion. "You know her or somethin? You'd think that you'd just told her you were terminal or something, the way she looked." Daxter continued, scratching his belly lazily.

"Told you. Fan Characters are all disturbed." said Jak. "That's what happens when you create a person using sub par writing."

Axel's eyes flashed with anger. "Shut the fuck up Jak. You should be kissing her boots right now, seeing as she saved you from the Avatars. Aren't they a little bit of a phobia for you?"

Jak scowled, "She probably just wanted a closer look at us. A trick or something to get our attention."

"Well, if that's true, let's go." said Axel, faking a move towards the door.

"No!" barked Jak. Daxter was so startled by the sudden noise that he fell off the chair.

Axel smirked. "Maybe lighten up on Xeros then, hmm?"

"Since when are you such a good Samaritan? You've pretty much been and asshole since we got here. Hell, you treat me and Dax like shit and all of a sudden, your standing up for some random Fan Character? What's with that?" demanded Jak angrily.

"Heh." Axel said, walking slowly across the room, "I at least gave you and Daxter a chance to prove yourselves to be useful. But you just assumed, right off the bat, that Xeros was worthless." Axel turned to face Jak, his green eyes abruptly serious. "And that really ticks me off. I know what it's like to be written off as a nobody...seeing as I am one."

Daxter stirred, "So if she's like, a Fan Character and a Nobody, does that make her twice as worthless?" he inquired.

Axel was about to light Daxter on fire when the door to the shack opened and Xeros reappeared.

"I've completed my task." she reported plainly. "Now, tell me again what you were doing in my city."

Jak and Axel blinked at each other. Daxter didn't seem to care what was going on; he had reclaimed his place on the chair and had proceeded to loll there like a small, furry walrus.

"Why should we tell you?" said Jak, obstinate as always. Xeros's grisarme appeared in her hand. Leveling the weapon, Xeros pointed the spear head at Jak's chest, "You are in my territory. You trespassed here. Explain, Original."

Jak did not respond, but Axel volunteered the answer, "Like I said, looking for Reality."

"Why here?" asked Xeros, her voice cold for lack of emotion.

"You Fan Charters go straight from Reality to Fiction. We figured the door might go both ways." he explained.

A slight frown touched Xeros' otherwise mask-like face. "Don't you think we've already investigated that? If the doors we used to access Fiction also lead to Reality, we would have left this place a long time ago." Xeros said, her weapon disappearing from her hand. "At the end of their stories, Fan Characters go into a kind of coma. We sleep through whatever methods get us into Fiction, and can't replicate them to become full members of Reality. This happens to all Fan Characters. All." she said.

Axel hadn't really thought the door would have been in such an obvious location anyway, but he was a little disappointed none the less. "Any idea where it might be?" he asked aloud.

"Yes, actually." said Xeros, as plainly as ever. Jak's eyes widened instantly, and Daxter fell out of his chair again.

"You shitting me?" asked Daxter, filled with awe and disbelief, "Cause I mean me an Jak, we've been looking for it for ages. But we never so much got a clue..."

Jak scowled the talkative ottsel into silence, but continued the dubious thread of thought. "Yeah. How'd you manage to figure this place out? Why should your guess be better than anyone elses?"

"When our infrequent storms do form, they move in a predictable pattern. From my unchanging plot of ground here I can observe them accurately. Whenever a storm comes through, it flows right to left across the sky. Always right to left. That means, there is a circular wind patten up there that does not affect the ordinary clouds lightning bearing clouds. A hurricane-style wind drives the storms, that I know is true. And at the eye, that is where the door to Reality is, I think." Xeros said placidly, her shrouded stare without a hint of enthusiasm.

"If you knew where it was, why didn't you go after it?" demanded Jak.

Xeros cocked her head to the side slowly, as if she was observing an interesting bug in a bell jar. "I had responsibilities here. I am the leader of this village, and keeping the Fan Characters that live here safe is a full time obligation. I could not let them down."

"Worth a fucking shot." Jak said, forgetting to be condescending in his enthusiasm. "Axel, let's get out of here."

"Wait a minute." Axel said to Jak. Then he turned to Xeros. "So...are you really a member of Organization 13?" he asked her, indicating her cloak.

Much to Axel's surprise, Xeros laughed, the fog clearing from her eyes. "More like Organization 13 million. Everyone wants their Fan Character to be part of the Organization. _Every_one. I think we outnumber Keyblade wielders now. But yeah, in my story, I was."

"So you are a Nobody, same as me?" asked Axel, curious to see if Xeros's author had been able to capture the idea of heartlessness well enough.

"For all intents and purposes, yes. I have no heart, no emotions and no feelings." said Xeros, her voice slowly receding to a monotone again as the fog returned behind her eyes. "Though ultimately, aren't all creatures of Media or Fiction Nobodies? All we denizens like a true human soul, as the Reality dwellers have." Jak shifted uncomfortably at this notion. For Axel, the idea of his emotions being an illusion was nothing new, but Jak never seemed to have come to terms with the fact that he was not actually 'real'.

Xeros, in her uncanny, silent way, seemed to be watching Axel, waiting for him to realize his next question. _It's like she doesn't have anything over her own. _realized Axel; a revelation which prompted his next question. "No offense Xeros, but you seem even more emotionless than most Nobodies. What's up with that?" asked Axel.

"I can not even feign emotion in many situations, because my memories of feelings have all faded completely away." Xeros explained with a Spartan simplicity which cheapened her misfortune to all but fellow Nobodies, who knew her plight well.

"Hey hey! You haven't lost _all_ your feelings yet! You look like your experiencing emotion sometimes when you look at Axel, sometimes!" pointed out Daxter with crass honesty.

Axel shot Daxter a death glare, then apologized for the 'rodent'. "He's and idiot." Axel said.

"No he isn't. He's correct." Xeros said bluntly. "In my story, I was paired with you, Axel."

That surprised Axel, probably more than it should have, given his will know popularity with Avatars. Arching his tiny eyebrows, Axel asked, "So why did you bring us here again? Were you just trying to get at me or something?" in a cold tone.

The fog behind Xeros' eyes cleared abruptly, and a brief blaze of red flickered beneath her cheeks. "It isn't like that!" she snapped dangerously. "The Axel I knew probably wasn't anything like you are all! He was the author's rendition of you, so he might have been out of character, technically. I'm not gonna pressure you to pick up where he and I left off. You and him...I would never confuse the two!" Xeros said fiercely. Axel got the impression that she considered that a respect to her former mate, and not the 'real' him.

_That explained why it hurt her that I didn't know her name. _Thought Axel as he ran his hand through his hair. _If she really did like...that guy who looked like me in her story, then it must be really hard for her to meet the real me...Though she doesn't have to be so damn bitchy about it._

"What happened to the Axel you knew when the story ended?" asked Jak, tactlessly.

"Well, that depends on how much his personality mirrored the Original Axel's." Xeros explained gruffly, gesturing in Axel's direction. "If he was sort of similar, he would look the same as Axel, but opaque, like the Fan Characters here who are based of their authors. If he was a well balanced character but was nothing like Axel, then he would look like Axel but have a completely different personality. If his personality was not balanced, then he would look like a twisted version of Axel. And if he was exactly alike...he wouldn't have come here at all." she growled. Her purplish glare had become so fierce Jak had taken an unconscious step away from her, and Daxter had clambered to the safety of Jak's shoulder plate.

"So you mean...I might have a bunch of evil, out of character twins walking around in Fiction?" asked Axel worriedly. The concept was unnerving.

"Not evil, generally, but yes it is quite possible, even probable." explained Xeros. She was slipping back into her emotionless state.

"What would make you...remember your emotions? So you wouldn't keep slipping between your normal state and the zombie...fog...thing?" asked Axel. As uncomfortable as Xeros made him, she had done him a great service in telling him the probable location of Fiction, and it was only right that he tried to do something for her in return.

"Going with you three. That would be greatly beneficial." she said, her lack of embarrassment opening up the floodgates of honesty. Before Axel could question her as to why that would be helpful, Xeros headed to the door of her shack again, "Now if you excuse me, I have some business to attend to with my second in command, Sheara. Please do not go anywhere; I shall return momentarily."

"Apparently the fog makes her formal." muttered Axel to himself as the poorly formed door clacked against its frame.

"Way to go man! I bet she cleans up real nice! Get her a haircut and some girl clothes and yow!" said Daxter as he tried to slap Axel on the back. "Though I have to say, she is pretty smokin in that cloak too..."

"Let's go before she comes back." suggested Jak, making a move for the door.

Axel had to admit he was tempted to; the last thing he needed was some random girl who was in love with his evil twin hanging off his arm the entire trip. _Then again, she can't actually love, so I should be okay, right?._ "Nah. Let's bring her." Axel said, helping himself to a chair.

"Are you insane? She'll just slow us down. She's no better then those Avatars who are such big fans of you! Don't let her fool you into thinking she's worth something." Jak said harshly.

Before Axel could lazily rebuke Jak's argument, Xeros reappeared. Jak appeared to be furious that Axel had let their opportunity for escape slip by.

Walking resolutely at Xeros' side was a creature Axel assumed to be Sheara. If it was Sheara, she was a tan-from-a-can orange anthropomorphic dragon, with large wings filled with red webbing. The dragon-girl wore her hair in a cascading pony tail, and sported a 'practical' leather top with matching pants. Though her draconic features made it difficult to judge her age, Axel guessed that Sheara might be in her late teens, though he couldn't place what gave that away.

"Gentlemen, this is Sheara. She is to inherit the legacy of the village when I leave here." Xeros said, waving her hand to indicate the dragon girl.

"Xeros told me just recently that I would be taking over. It was somewhat...unexpected news." Sheara said with an attempt at confidence. Though she seemed shaken up by the transfer of power, she wanted desperately to make a good impression.

"Sheara, please fetch me the papers we discussed from my library upstairs." Xeros said, without looking at her assistant. Sheara bowed herself away and hurried upstairs.

"She will be a good leader for the village." Sheara confided, arranging a small, worn table in front of a chair. While her company watching in silence, she sat behind the table, her hands folded calmly over the wood.

Xeros glanced at Jak, then Daxter then, with somewhat more hesitation, at Axel. As her strange red purple gaze locked with Axel's own emerald stare, he instantly felt...invaded somehow. That sort of 'naked in public' feeling. _The Hell..._ Axel wondered.

"You're worried I might be a burden to you in this trip. That I might confuse you, Axel, with my partner from my story." Xero stated plainly. "You need not worry. I am not in love with you're face. I have met many imitation Axel's, and none of them were...him." Xeros's fog cleared briefly, to let a little sadness show. "I will not presume that you will care for me the way he did, simply because you look alike." she stated.

Then, turning her frighteningly invasive stare on Jak she said, "You share your condensing attitude towards Fan Characters with many Originals. I can assure you, I am just as helpful as you are, and just as strong, and just as intelligent. I ask that you treat me as such."

She gave no comment to Daxter. Perhaps because he wasn't thinking anything interesting. Or PG rated.

Before Axel and Jak could ask Xeros how she had read their minds, Sheara returned to the bottom floor of the shack with a pile of papers in paw.

"Ma'm, the papers you requested." Sheara said, her voice finally beginning to quiver a little. The reality of leadership was beginning to bear down on her, Axel could tell. He doubted Xeros' wisdom in selecting this particular creature to inherit this valuable spit of land.

For several tense moments, Xeros' guests watched as their madder hostess signed page after page of yellowed paper with a brilliant gold and red plume. It seemed riotous and comically out of place among the stuffy furniture and lurking depression. For lack of personal interest in the political power change, Axel began to formulate a theory behind Xeros' mind reading talents. _I'm fire, Vexen was ice, Marluxia was flower power...Xeros, I think, is some kind of psychic. _

"Correct." came the dead voice, over the sounds of rifling papers. Everyone in the room but Axel flinched at the sudden interruption of the silence. "I am the Madder Observer, gifted with a range of psychic talents. Psychometry, mind reading, kinesis, limited mind control, mostly. It has it's advantages, one of them being making sure I am not walking into some sort of trap laid by newcomers. I've no reason to trust you, beyond what I see in your heads."

"Bitch." Jak hissed, reaching for his gun. "Who the Hell do you think you are?" Sheara snarled at him, shifting her weight into a more battle ready position. Daxter just looked confused.

"If you are going to be checking up on my mind every so often, the I don't want you coming with us." he said sharply.

Xeros stopped writing briefly, though her expressionless gaze did not shift from her work, nor did it betray any hint of what she was contemplating. "Very well. For the remainder of our journey, I won't presume permission to peer into your skulls." This pronounced, she continued her writing.

"Xeros! I must protest!" Sheara said, annoyed and alarmed. "What if their intentions changed? How would you know. Limiting your range puts you in great danger, for no benefits!"

"The best benefit I could receive for this journey is two able bodied allies." Xeros said. Daxter coughed angrily, and Xeros added, "And their pet. In any case Sheara, what reason can I give them to trust me? I'm sure they have doubts about my personal integrity. If sacrificing a portion of my power is what I have to do to gain their confidence, then it is small price to pay."

Sheara shrank back slightly at this rebuke, eyeing her mentor with slight resentment, "I was merely worried about your security Ma'm..."

Xeros' plume clattered to the desk suddenly, signaling the end of her work. As she stood, Sheara snapped to attention, her spine rigid and her paws clenched.

Examining Sheara with curiosity, Xeros said, "There is no need for that respect Sheara. It is I who answer to you now." Then, putting her fist over her empty chest, Xeros bowed deeply to her former assistant.

Disinterested by the inaugural ceremony, Jak sighed loudly and tapped his foot, rudely displaying his impatience. Axel however, was fascinated by the display. _Sheara probably doesn't know how one-sided her admiration is. Xeros doesn't have a heart...she's incapable of caring for Sheara's well-being. But even so, she's putting on this little show for Sheara's emotion benefit. _Axel cradled his chin in his hand _Can someone be kind without the influence of emotion? Without a heart, what makes a Nobody act in a kind way? Or an evil way. Fuck, I've seen both sides of the coin. Been on both sides. But without the presence of a heart...why?_ Axel had never been one for philosophy before his death, but in the strange afterlife of Fiction, it seemed to have gained a new importance for him. Ordinarily, some level of self discovery was required to progress through these kinds of situations; that was his impression in any case. _...but a Nobody has so little 'self' to examine..._

Indeed, Sheara looked as though she was beginning to become teary eyed as Xeros rose from her bow. The dragon girl looked as though she wanted to say something to her mentor, but the risk of tears was to great for her to open her mouth.

"Now then." Xeros said, "I believe that we are infringing on you're dwellingplace. I'm sure you have much business to attend to, and we would not want our presence to interfere with your work. Madam, I bid you good day, and thank you for your audience." Motioning slightly to Jak and Axel, Xeros made a move for the door and let herself out. The old building seemed determined to keep her, because the door was stuck more firmly in the jamb then ever. When it did finally admit her to the outside world, signaling its displeasure with a howling creak, Sheara stayed her guests for a little longer with a question. "Xeros. Why leave now?"

Xeros turned slowly, giving her pupil the same blank look she gave all but Axel, "Because now is the time." she said simple, and stepped lightly onto the dusty streets of the town that was once hers.


	14. Genial

Xeros stepped outside of what had formerly been her home. Behind her, Jak's heavy boots fell thickly against the wood, like two paddles slapping against water. Axel moved with an almost womanish poise, barely scuffing the floor with his black soles.

The filthy town, spread perfectly panoramic before her, had become Xeros' world since she 'Awakened' from her story. Fiction was a place devoid of fate, luck of any kind and possibly a higher power; Xeros knew it was chance and grit that had gotten her this far, and she could rely on the second to get her further.

She lacked the ability to regret, so she couldn't pin for her loss of queendom, but she could second guess her logic in leaving the relative safety of the fan character village. Xeros considered the fan characters her comrades, joined by a fellowship of disappointment when they were jerked rudely from their Avatar-authored dreamworlds.

From what she had seen in their heads, Jak and Axel were working toward a common goal by pure chance and that their scant friendship, though growing, was hardly enough to sustain their companionship. Their loyalty towards her was even more slim, and Xeros got the impression that they would abandon her in a second if it would save either of their skins, directions to Reality or no. As for the rat thing, Xeros couldn't care less what it's role in the group was; it was too small to do anything anyway, besides making a sinewy meal. Other than that, useless.

"What's next?' Axel asked casually, crossing his arms over his broad chest. Overhead, the thick clouds had been whipped into a frothy green bile, barely containing the heavy water within.

Gazing at the sky with flat, madder eyes, Xeros watched the sky boil with threats. "We finish securing the city, in exchange for shelter in someone's home. After that, we'll wait out the storm and depart as soon as it's clear."

A single, fat raindrop plopped onto Daxter's head, so chilled it was on the edge of freezing. "Ow ow ow ow OW!" the Ottsel yelped, slapping as his damp fur. "C...c...cold!" he chattered. "Couldn't you have waited until after the storm to give up your house?" he wailed as another raindrop flopped onto his back.

"Let's go. There isn't much time until the rain begins to fall in earnest." Xeros said, jogging toward the edge of town. Axel followed, loping easily along with her. Jak hesitated, unwilling to assist the fan character with her world.

"You're not going to like getting left out in the cold." Xeros called back.

Grudgingly, Jak lurched forward and followed Xeros and Axel to the perimeter wall. Fan characters were working frantically at the wall, like ants around a crumb. The constant din of hammers against metal and wood rose above even the frenzied hiss of the wind.

"We need..." Xeros shouted, emptying her lungs to be heard over the din, "...to firm up the wall!"

"Why?" Axel asked "I thought we were fixing roofs or something?"

"You really don't know anything about the fan characters then." Jak said nastily. "The desert becomes a big soup of quicksand when it rains, and whoever is stuck there tried to reach the only secure ground...here. Of course, the fan characters don't like that kind of intrusion." Jak slapped the tough wood of the wall. "I've heard the land is stationary here thanks to the bones of Originals and Fan Characters who drowned while clawing at this very wall. Might just be a folk story, but I'd sat there's a grain of truth to it."Jerking a thumb at the palmetto field, Jak added, "They post their best warriors over there, to ensure nobody sneaks through the plants. Who knows what they Hell they do with the bodies."

Axel looked at Xeros, curling his lip with disgust, "Is this true?" he asked.

Unflinchingly and perfectly without emotion, Xeros said, "Yes. We do what we need to survive. If you want to purchase and overnight stay on this side of the wall, you'll swallow your sense of justice and help."

A tall malformed fan character jogged up to the trio, panting heavily. The fan character looked as though she had been intended as a sailor scout, but her waist was narrowed to a frightening thinness, as though the had nearly been pulled apart. Her knees and elbows stood out much larger than her twiggy arms and legs. In fact, everything about her seemed gaunt, worn, stretched and smoked to the filter except for her hair. Somehow, her silken pink hair remained perfect and elegant, despite the dirt, rain and grime that coated the rest of her body. The hair's glittering beauty made her shabby condition seem even more pathetic. "Xeros! What are you doing her?"the fan character asked worriedly, her voice several octaves higher than ordinary human range.

"Fixing the wall." Xeros siad tonelessly as she adjusted a log.

"No Ma'm no! You've got to get inside! It wouldn't be any good if you caught cold of here." The fan character clutched Xeros with her long, pale fingers.

"You no longer have any obligation to protect me, Sailor Peach-Fairy. I have turned control of the town over to Sheara, and I plan to leave here as soon as the storm subsides. Would you still be willing to provide me with shelter?"

"Naturally..." Sailor Peach-Fiary stammered, "But why..." she shook her head. "No, your decisions have been good in the past. I'm not going to question your reasons for leaving."

"Would my Original companions be welcome was well? They are no use to be dead and frozen." Xeros said, indicating Axel and Jak.

"Xeros, your friends are mine." Sailor Peach-Fairy said, though she gave Jak and Axel a skeptical, and perhaps jealous, glance. "Why don't you come back with me now? The rain's picking up."

Axel, who hated the pervasive wetness of the rain looked at the fan character with gratitude.

"Jak, Axel and their pet may go with you. I've got ti finish checking the work on the wall." Xeros said blankly. Water was beginning to clot her hair into thick, wet ropes.

"Sounds like a plan." Jak said gravely as he shifted from foot to foot while Daxter hugged close to his neck to avoid the rain. The rodent was beginning to smell.

"Yeah. Xeros knows where Sailor eh...Peach Fairy lives right? So we can just..." the Ottsel began to suggest. He sputtered into silence, disturbed by Xeros' mechanical work at the wall. It was impossible to tell whether she had taken offense to his statement or not.

Axel, frowning and throughly drenched at this point, observed Xeros' mindless work and snapped, "You don't have any obligations to this place either then!" The women didn't even look up.

"Come on." Sailor Peach-Fairy said gently, tugging at Jak's shirt. He flinched at her touch, resisting the urge to slap the fan character's hand away.

"My House is this way." the lanky sailor scout said, walking along the perimeter wall of the village. Jak and Axel followed in silence, wincing as the rain traced the contours of their faces in cold torrents.

Finally, the silent procession reached Sailor Peach-Fairy's shack, which was situated scarcely 2o feet back from the perimeter wall. The house was constructed in a strange, rambling style, as though it was trying to be a Victorian townhouse and failing miserably. Shingles, which appeared to be made of large scales, clung to the roof in pathetic bunches as though they were the final protesting leaves of fall resisting winter's gravity. Several other portions of the house seemed to have been constructed from enormous fish bones, and even the scent of wet soil couldn't overpower the lingering scent of chum.

"Here we are." Sailor Peach-Fairy said, unlocking the door with a worn and rusty key.

"You have locksmiths here, but you can't build a perimeter wall that stands up to a few desperately flailing intruders?" Axel asked suspiciously.

"We had a locksmith. A little Asian Original from some movie or another. He was very good with doors to all over. He disappeared awhile back though. Most of us think he foraged a key to Reality and found the proper door. He helped some other man find a similar door back in his Media, actually. I hope he did get to Reality though. He was a nice man." Before letting anyone enter her home, Xeros peered hopefully into the rain, to see if Xeros had tagged along after all. "Xeros will be along shortly, I'm sure." she added, with the tone of needing reassurance.

Jak seemed unwilling to provide any comfort, so Axel said, "Yeah." absently before he entered the house. The rain was even heavier now, with each individual droplet slamming madly into the dirt and furrowing a little crater with it's impact. Axel had tried to thwart their attack by raising his hood, but it hadn't done him any good. The rain hurt and soaked him all the same.

Jak knelt sulkily by a dead fireplace, while Daxter shivered like an orange dishrag.

"Hey Axel? Can a man get a light here?" the Ottsel said between chattering teeth.

With a distracted flinch of his wrist, Axel lit the pile of wood stored between the bricks on fire, which instantly flooded the tenement with heat and light. Than he began to pace uneasily like a tiger, restless without conscious reason.

"Ah! You got that fire going! Are you one of those firebenders? Sometimes we get a fancharacter from that series through here." Sailor Peach-Fairy asked as she took her knee high boots off.

"No. I am not a...whatever that was. Firebender." Axel grumbled and continued to pace. He really didn't feel like asked what a 'firebender' was at the time, though he made a mental note to ask Jak later.

Sailor Peach-Fairy's gaunt face stretched into an expression of pity. "No need to worry about Xeros. She'll be fine." she told Axel kindly.

Axel arced his tiny eyebrows, "Are you talking to me?"

"Oh ah..I guess I misinterpreted..." she began.

"Yeah, you did." Axel snapped coldly. The wet did nothing for his temper.

The sound of heavy rain against the rood filled the awkward silence with a machine gun rattle. In a few minutes, Axel grew tired of the rain-noise and tried his hand at conversation again. "So Sailor whatever. Why don't you leave here? Go questing for Reality like Xeros?" he asked.

Sailor Peach-Fairy hesitated, formulating her answer before replying. "Well I...it's been such a hard journey to get to just this place...and it's an even more difficult path to Reality. It's not for people like me...it's easier just to take second best rather than risk it all. Here, I have a house, some security, a role, safety. I could disappear forever out there...I would rather just survive I guess."

"Yeah, it's no cakewalk getting to Reality, Axel. A fan character like her could never do it." Jak snorted from in front of the fire.

Axel glared at him and then turned back to the Sailor Scout fan character. "Well, I wouldn't recommend giving up so easily. All or nothing is better that mediocre."

Before Sailor Peach-Fairy could respond, a slow thud began to sound rhythmically against the door. A knock.

Nervously, Sailor Peach-Fairy fumbled with her key and admitted her visitor.

Xeros, sopping wet and looking all the world like some dread wraith come to call on homes unmarked by lamb's blood, stepped inside. "Thank you." she said hollowly, dripping on the ragged skin carpet.

"M'am! You're soaking! Pleas, sit by the fire!." Sailor Peach-Fairy said frantically. Even in the half light, Axel could tell she was blushing.

"My thanks." Xeros said as she squatted before the fireplace. Jak scooted away from her.

The group dipped into silence again as consciousness dissolved into sleep, in spite of the hammering of rain and the occasion desperate shrieks of those left beyond the wall. Daxter dreamt of large breasted women, fondling him and stroking his fur. Jak, who slept lightly from habit, was never too immersed in his dreams to wake at the giggling of approaching Avatars. His dreams were mere impressions; vaugue recollections and the lose associated them. Ashelin and Keira and Tess...

Axel and Xeros, being Nobodies, did not dream at all.


	15. Gadabout

The absence of rain-beats against the shack's roof woke Axel. Even in the gloom, his eyes glinted like back-lit gems, sharp and pretentious. Sky peeped between the poorly joined timber above him, it's face returned to the ordinary grey hues of Fiction.

Xeros, Jak, Daxter and their FC host lay crumpled around the fireplace like discarded dolls. Axel noted that Xeros in particular seemed to sleep as though she had been thrown to the floor, with her limbs arranged like jumbled matchsticks. However, there was something about her face that was markedly un-dollish; a rare smile teased the corners of her lips. Axel thought she looked much prettier that way. _Guess it's like she said. Her memories of emotion are buried deeper than mine. _Axel mused. Then he remembered what kind of story she had come from and hoped she wasn't thinking of him.

Daxter, who had woken to when Axel 'accidently' stepped on a particularly creaky floorboard near the Ottsel's head, yawned cheerily as he got up. "Damn that was AWSOME!" he said, "I haven't slept that well since we got to this fucking place! Fan characters sure know how to shack a guy up!"

Sailor Peach-Fairy, who had risen at the loud report against the wood, completely ignored Daxter and began to dote on Xeros, who was also waking slowly. "Are you alright M'am? How was your night?" she asked.

"Fine, thanks. My companions and I will have to get going though. Thanks again for letting us borrow some floor." Xeros replied as she stretched. Her casual tone caught Axel off guard. _I guess her 'fog' cleared. At least temporarily. _He thought.

"Gentleman and rat, let's get this show on the road." Xeros said, pausing in the doorframe to wink back into the house.

"Right..." Jak said rolling his eyes, his carbine clicking against his belts as he staggered to his feet. Axel's eyebrows peaked as he followed Xeros out of the shack.

"Yeah, she's one nutzy bitch." Jak whispered to Daxter as they left. Sailor Peach-Fairy fretted at the doorway, bemused at her leader's sudden departure. Not an especially quick thinker, the fan character didn't even realize she had forgotten to offer the group water until after they were long gone.

As the group followed Xeros through the palmetto forest, Axel caught up with her and snagged her shoulder.

"Why are you so cheery?" he asked skeptically, "You didn't seem so gung-hoe about this the other day."

Xeros seemed to cool down a little at that question, "No reason..." she said coughing into her gloved hand. "I just thought of some additional advantages to the trip. That's all."

During the storm, the desert had undergone it's 12 hour shift, becoming a flat, salt encrusted wasteland. As Jak left the palmettos for the sunless heat of the desert, Daxter groaned loudly, "Son of a bitch...How did we get saddled with this pile of shit."

"Whining isn't going to get us anywhere." Jak reprimanded, tapping Daxter's skull with one thick knuckle.

"Yeah tube sock. Suck it." Axel said distractedly, as he stared at the soundless veins of purple lightning wriggling through the flat grey clouds.

"Depending on who you're talking to, this desert's a curse or a blessing." Xeros said, leaving little footprints behind her as she tread across the salt crust. "It's deterred unwanted visitors from the village forever."

"No one cares, bitch." Jak said sharply. Daxter looked at Jak in surprise, and even Axel shot him a look.

"Wasn't that a little...ah uncalled for?" Daxter asked his foster brother.

"The 'unwanted visitors' she's talking about are OC's in need. She wouldn't have let us in if it wasn't for your pretty face, Axel."

The recollection of anger and offense twisted behind Xeros' eyes, and her mind hardened as though crippled by disgust. She couldn't actually feel the emotion, but it affected her thought patterns all the same. "We watch out for our own. Seems like you OC's have some trouble with that." Xeros tittered.

Jak looked at her with revulsion, as though he had been presented with something particularly filthy. Even Daxter flattened his ears against his head to signal his distemper. "You bitch." Daxer said, aghast.

"Both of you can go to Hell." Axel said sharply. "If I have to listen to this shit all the way to Reality, I'm ditching both of you. I don't have the fucking patience to put up with you." However, Axel did remember that the locksmith that had worked on Sailor Peach-Fairy's house had been an Original, though he reasoned that this might not be the opportune time to point this out to Jak.

Xeros was shocked back into her emotionless state by Axel's rebuke and carried on across the desert as though the confrontation hadn't occurred. Jak fumed silently as Daxter curled defensively around his shoulders.

Axel frowned, beginning to feel the dry hear on his lips despite his affinity to such high temperatures. _You can keep your desert Xeros_ he thought, swiping his mouth with the back of his hand _There isn't even anything left to burn here._

----------------------------

Hours later, the party was feeling even more depleted than usual. Jak was doing his best to remain strong and stony, but his spit was beginning to congeal into a thick froth and his lips were cracking like paper. He had a close call in a desert once, and was starting to feel that experience was going to be repeated. Daxter lay limply over his shoulder, with his tongue lolling comically. "Kinda familiar, eh big guy?" The ottsel said dryly.

The Organization members were more sensibly dressed for the desert, and since there was no sun to absorb rays from, the coloring of their cloaks did them no harm. However, the queer nature of the heat was beginning to get on Axel's nerves. It had no source, no sun to turn away from or fire to manipulate. Rather, it seemed to come from the air itself, and settled heavily on even Axel's skin, though he could normally tolerate much greater temperatures. Xeros didn't seem to notice that she was deteriorating physically, and she continued at a hard, steady pace, though her eyes were drying out and her skin was flaking at her cheekbones and knuckles.

"Maybe we should, you know, take a break or something?" Axel suggested, nearly gagging on the oven baked air.

Turning around, Xeros gave him an empty stare, "Yes. That sounds reasonable. If that is what you want."

"Yes!" Jak, Daxter and Axel moaned in unison.

"You look like you need it, too." Axel said, pointing out Xeros' wavering knees. She looked down at herself as though she was figuring out that she had a body for the first time.

"Discomfort is an illusion here, anyway." She said, shrugging nonchalantly.

"Tell that to my bone-dry innards." Daxter said sassily.

Xeros rolled her eyes, showing at least some human sentiment. "If it'll make you feel better, I'll dowser for water after the landscape changes again. The chances of us getting another dustbowl like this are slim."

Axel, sensing that she was weaving out of her 'fog' state again, decided to experiment to see what governed this constant shifting between doll-like indifference and near humanity. _Perhaps a few recall questions will coax her all the way 'out'_ ,_ then I can set about seeing what gets her into this funk. _Axel schemed. "What other powers do you have again?" he asked, with real interest.

Xeros cocked an eyebrow at him, giving him a look of amused curiosity. "I told you already. Telekinesis, psychometry and slight mind reading. And dowsing."

"Well, you left dowsing out the firs time." Axel pointed out.

"Habit. What do you expect? In the middle of the desert, people might be tempted to ah, 'exploit' me if they knew I could make their trip easier. I can't say my callers were very kind, typically. Particularly the Avatars I dealt with." she shook her head, as if to dislodge a bad memory. "As for my powers, I've gotta good selection of talents, but I'm not expert with any of them. Jack of all trades, master of none, you know?"

Jak, who had never heard that particular adage before, assumed it was a slight against him and snarled quietly at his firearm. Since his older brother was distracted by anger, Daxter decided to ask a surprisingly intelligent question in his place. "Ya know, that's not what I heard about you Fan Characters. I heard you guys came into Fiction 100 perfect, aside from the ah mutation...thingys." He finished lamely, looked weakly at Jak for a little support. The man was still busy being surly.

Chuckling, Xeros peered out over the desert to watch for the white curtain that signaled the change. "You're thinking about Mary Sues pal, and there is nothing perfect about them. Sure, they come into Fiction with plenty of fighting prowess, but their personalities are locked into place by stereotypes. No room for growth, you know? They can't learn. But like I said, they can really fight." Xeros considered her palm for a moment. "Well, I assume that they can. Mary Sues and legit FC s end up in different parts of Fiction. I've met some very Sue-like FC s, probably right on th edge cases I bet, but the real nature of Mary Sues is almost all speculation." She nodded into the hazy grey distance. "We'll have to cross the Fangorn Mountains, and that's a one way trip into the Sue's land. Only Avatars and Avatar controlled Originals can go back and forth across them. The really powerful and really stupid Mary Sues are trapped over there. That's the only evidence of a merciful higher power I've ever seen in Fiction."

It was Axel's turn to raise an eyebrow with curiosity. "So how the Hell do you even know that Mary Sues even exist? If nobodies even been there and back again, how can you say what's over there."

"Dumbledore, mostly." Jak said, finally speaking up from his seat on the ground. "That, and a few, very few, Originals who have been released by their Avatar captures and restored to their original personalties. Accounts of Mary Sues are rare, but they're always bad."

"Sounds like were heading for quite the summer home then." Axel said sarcastically.

Xeros grimaced, "Hell, it isn't even that bad for you Originals. Mary Sues were invented to love you. Worship you, even. They kill people like me. Rivals, as they see it. They probably fight each other a lot though. Hopefully enough to thin their numbers a little."

"And leave the most powerful ones behind." Axel said cynically.

"Your fucking insane if you think that I am crossing those mountains with only your word that the door to Reality is somewhere on the other side." Jak spat as he stood from his crouched position.

"You've spend how many years wandering around in circles here. Isn't that enough proof for you, or do you feel like wasting more of your time?" Xeros snapped back.

Before the arguing required Axel's intercession to quell, the pale veil that signaled the change in landscape appeared on the horizon, trailing a new desert behind it. The group was briefly suspended in white light before they were deposited on the new desert.


	16. Ghastly

"Been awhile since I went through that." Xeros said, sounding a little shaken. "Oh, this is much much better!" The desert was indeed much more hospitable. Occasional scraggily trees poked through the landscape, and the ground was covered in tall, mostly dead, grass.

"Kind of a 'plains' more than a desert if you ask me, but I won't complain." Axel said, running his hand over the dry blades.

"What about the water?" Jak demanded, forgetting or ignoring the fact that he had nearly come to blows with Xeros just a moment before.

"Seriously." Daxter said blankly, "This ain't the time to be admiring the scenery."

Sighing, Xeros held her slim arm straight out in front of her and summoned her gisarme boredly, as though completing this task would be a great inconvenience to her. Rather than catching the hovering weapon, she allowed it to float in midair in front of her, dangling against gravity like a still but weighty pendulum. Compelled by some invisible will, the gisarme began to glide forward as deliberately and silently as a ghost. Xeros pattered after her weapon, and with some reluctance (and mutual shrugs of confusion) Jak and Axel pelted after her. They watched as the gisarme froze abruptly in midair, then thrust itself blade-first into the soil.

"There we go." Xeros said with satisfaction as she struggled to pry the weapon from the packed earth. When she succeeded, the divot left behind was filled with water. Jak and Daxter fell upon the pool instantly, greedily sucking down the liquid with just enough delicacy to prevent any loss to the earth. Daxter almost said 'thank you'.

Xeros simply stood back at watched, sheathing her gisarme in darkness.

"Don't you want any?" Axel asked, suspicious, with thoughts of poisoned springs flitting through his head.

Shaking her head so her unruly hair flipped in her face Xeros declined, "My gisarme tells me where the water is, but not how much is there. Besides, it's not like I need it." Xeros shrugged.

"Why not?" Axel asked, rocking an eyebrow. "Usually, water is pretty conducive to living."

"Unless the rules of 'life' are made by a group of mostly pre-adolescent females. They wouldn't want their precious Originals or FC s dying of such mundane things as dehydration or starvation. Same as they don't want us to get old, or dirty, or disfigured by wounds. Why do you think you never see Jak clipping his toenails? Or me shaving for that matter, which would be a Hell of a job with a gisarme. Bodily functions are on hold."

Axel smirked, "So everyone is a Nobody here, then?"

"Pretty much. Isn't comradery grand?" Xeros said wryly, crinkling her slender eyes so they grinned as well.

"Misery loves company, eh?" Axel agreed as he watched Jak and Daxter drink their fill. His dry tongue ached to join them, but he loathed the idea of being slave to a false sensation. "Guess that they're not ready to be disillusioned." he noted.

"Who likes being told their not real?" Xeros countered.

"Nobody."

"Exactly."

--------------------

More sufficiently watered, Jak and Daxter continued to follow Xeros with no additional eagerness but renewed stamina. Daxter had even pulled out his Rubix cube to pass the time. Axel trailed along behind her as well, eying the tall glade with suspicion. In his Media, a similar grassland had concealed a pride of lions, as well as hordes of Heartless. He couldn't imagine that this terrain was much more friendly.

As if to confirm this unspoken suspicion, a patch of grass to Axel's left rustled, the blades hissing together, producing an awful, dry sound that slunk right down his spine. Instantly, Axel's chakrams were in hand, Xeros' grisarme made an appearance and Jak fired a volley of rounds in the general direction of the grass clump. The bullets raised little puffs of dust as they burrowed into the ground. One raised a surprised yelp of pain.

_Wonder what he bagged..._ Axel thought as his emerald pupils slid back and forth from point to point of his shadowed eyes, trying to see what was lurking in the grass. Considering that he was standing what amounted to grass-shaped tinder, he was reluctant to use his powers for the sake of his guide and haphazard allies. Taking aim at the source of the shout, Jak prepared to shoot again when Xeros slapped his gun down with the flat side of her gisarme. Rounds slammed into the ground around Jak's feet, causing Daxter to shriek in surprise as Jak pitched forward.

"Hold fire!" Xeros ordered, both orally and mentally. The thought was accompanied by an impulse, a sudden disinterest in attacking. Jak's finger slipped from the trigger and Daxter slumped limply against Jak's head.

"It's not an enemy." Xeros said, allowing her gisarme to dissipate. Slinking through the grass like a black-clad cat, Xeros picked through the brush, following the obnoxious whining of "ow ow ow ow ow ow" broken by an occasional inbreathing. What she finally plucked from the grass was no a creature, but a young boy with a large head and a black trench coat. His most defining feature by far was his strange black hair, which was shaped vaguely like an upside down Nike swoosh. One of his legs was seized up and bleeding, apparently from a bullet wound.

Plopping him down in front of Jak's feet, the boy began jibbering in a quick, shoty staccato voice. "Who are you people? What're you..hey wait a second...you...your members of that Organization...thingie. Am I right?" The boy seemed able to go from extreme pain to intense interest with a smoothness approaching insanity. "I don't know who you are.." he said indicating Jak as sudden recognition swept across his face. "Hey...you SHOT me! Why did you shoot me?" the boy demanded. Jak looked bemused and vaguely disgusted.

"Technically, Axel's the only official member. I'm a fan character. Xeros. And you are...?" Xeros let the question hang.

"Dib." the boy said, eying Daxter with curiosity. "Are you a radioactive mongoose?" he asked, almost forgetting that he was watering the desert with his own oily blood.

"No..." Daxter said slowly, then whispered into Jak's overlarge ear, "How the Hell do we find this kindsa people?"

"Wait a minute. I've heard that name before." Xeros thought aloud. "Dib Dib Dib..."

Jak glanced at her from the corner of his eyes, brow furrowed in concentration.

Still bleeding out from the wound in his leg, Dib was beginning to look nervous, as though he had said too much. Before he could fumble out something to divert the conversation away from his half-placed familiarity, a glimmer went up behind Jak's eyes.

"Wait.." Jak said slowly, "You're Nny's younger brother, aren't you?" Expressionless and snake eyed, he turned his gun toward the boy again.

"Yeah, that's him." Xeros hissed, sliding into attack position and eyeing the nearby grasses with new suspicion.

"He...hey guys...It isn't like that... technically, we aren't even related...not even from the same Media.." Dib sputtered like fat suddenly slapped on a fryer. The heat was clearly turning up as Jak and Xeros edged towards him with all the menace of wolves about to take their prey.

"We should kill him. It'll keep Nny off our trails at least." Jak said dully, nestling the boy's head in his scope. Size made it an easy target.

"No!" Xeros commanded, "You want to get Nny mad at us? Just drive the kid off!"

"He'll just get Nny and set him on us for kicking him around!" Jak argued, snarling into his sight.

"Excuse me for cutting in." Axel said with a loaded smile, "But what the Hell is going on."

Cradling her forehead and closing her eyes as though her lashes were weighted with exasperation, Xeros sighed "Oh right, you're new." she casually indicated the wide eyed frantic boy. "Dib here is the brainchild of the same Avatar who created Nny, a dangerous murderer." Xeros' eyes became somewhat clouded with fog. "He killed some of my best fan character warriors while we were exploring around the base of the mountains. He...kills cruelly."

"He's just as likely to kill me as anyone else." Protested Dib "We're not actually..."

"What? Related? You're related by Avatar, and that's the closest bind of all." Jak retorted.

"Hold up, hold up. Kid, how did you know about the Organization?" Axel asked waving Jak aside.

"Oh. Well I was traveling with one of your members. For awhile anyway. Once she learned I was related to Nny, she just...ran off." Dib's voice was like stop and go traffic, either rife with hysteria or without it entirely. "Are you going to kill me?"

"The Organization member..Larxene right? How long ago did she leave?" Axel demanded, his eyebrows too short to actually knit with concern, but they tried valiantly to anyway.

"Oh saaay...at least three weeks ago." Dib managed. Axel could almost see him counting 12 hour cycles in his overlarge head.

"You've been traveling through Fiction alone?" Xeros asked, her fog blunting her surprise.

"Yeah. It hasn't been easy. I didn't think there'd be as many Avatars in the desert, but they kept finding me." Dib examined his own ruined leg and sighed, but said nothing else.

"How'd you even get to Fiction anyway?" Axel asked, "You don't look like you're involved in any business that would get you killed."

The inner points of Dib's eyes dove into and angry glare. "Zim." he hissed.

"That some kinda medication?" Daxter asked from Jak's shoulder.

"No...Zim's a an alien. He was trying to take over Earth. I was the only one who could stop him." By this time, Dib's explanation began to morph into a dramatic monologue.

"Why just you?" Xeros asked skeptically. "Plot point? Special powers?"

"NO! It was because NOBODY would believe me!" Dib shrieked. Jak very nearly shot him again, since pulling the trigger on his rifle had become his automatic reaction to 'surprise'.

"All these freakish...freaky...FREAKS in town just wouldn't believe me, even when the truth was living right...next...DOOR!" Dib was pointing a quivering finger into the distance, but Axel assumed he intended to indicate a building. "I tried to stop him...tried to enlist the help of the Swollen Eyeball Network...but nobody really knew..." Dib's fever seemed to die down a little, and when he began speaking again, it was in low, concentrated tones. "Finally, Zim got the upper hand. It took him long enough, but he actually managed to conquer Earth. It was as much of an accident as it was his own success. He jettisoned all the humans into space using something that looked like a really, really big taco. There's no sound in space, but I swear I had enough time to scream before I died. It...was an awful way to go. Even if it just took a second."

Xeros, Axel, Jak and Daxter looked at each other with varying degrees of shock. Daxter's chin was somewhere near his knees and Jak looked as though someone had given him a good strike to the behind with a cattle prod. Xeros' eyebrows were drawn together in disgust or concern, and Axel couldn't seem to find the right expression for his face; it kept shifting from something like disbelief to something that was almost pity, and he kept glancing at Xeros to see if she would authenticate the kid's story.

Dib continued his narration, seemingly unaware of his audience's reactions. "I've been searching for my kid sister and my Dad since I got here. Larxene and I met when we were running away from some Avatars. Like I said, she helped me fore a little while. " Dib poked absently at his leg, and then continued speaking with a kind of action-hero urgency. "But that's not why I'm here. I wanted to tell you Nny is on the move. I'm not sure if he's after one of you, but he's been pretty close. Too close for what you could consider comfort. I'd be careful if I were you."

"I knew he was working with Nny!" Jak snarled, preparing to shot the boy once again.

Axel used a swiftly summoned chakram to lasso the muzzle of the gun and point it to the ground. "There's a difference between 'working with' and 'warning'." he chided casually. "Kid's probably just been made to feel responsible for all Nny's killings by people like you and Xeros, who paint him as an accomplice. Probably trying to make it up to the world by giving us a fair chance." Then to Xeros, "Why not bring him with us? He can't care for himself with that leg..."

Xeros shook her head firmly. "If we want to avoid Nny, it would be better not to have a crippled companion. In addition, inviting yet another popular Original such as him to travel with us will only invite the attention of more Avatars. There's nothing we can do for him, and there's certainly nothing he can do for us."

Dib's massive head switched back and forth, as though he wanted to keep Jak, Xeros, Axel and Daxter in sight at all times. He did not look at his hands, even as they worried his like wound like carnage-drawn crabs.

"You're going to leave him here. To die." Axel asked eying Xeros curiously.

"Or to the Avatars." Jak frowned.

Xeros shrugged her slim shoulders, "Do you want to tote the injured around? Fine. But was far as I'm concerned, my conscience is clear. I didn't shoot him."

Jak grimaced, bearing the weight of guilt on his face. With a dismissive flick of her cloak, Xeros stalked into the high grass, which murmured conspiratorially around her. After a moment's hesitation Axel followed, but not without keeping a slim eye on Jak, who glowered over the fallen boy. Jak dropped awkwardly to one knee, and, after a hurried exchange of muted words with Dib, lifted the fallen boy carefully and moved him behind a large, concealing shrub.

"Hang on." Axel said, stopping to better observe the spectacle. Xeros halted as well, peering over her shoulder with mild interest as Jak ducked behind the bush as well. "You suppose he's doing something illegal, pretty boy?" she asked, sounding amused and something else Axel couldn't quite put a finger on. _Is she making fun of me?_ Axel wondered. Before he confront her angrily, a thin, ethereal light began to emit from behind the shrub, weak even in the half-light of Fiction. The blue white glimmer seemed to glow more than shine, like a lightning-bug's behind, modestly poking a few rays between the secretive leaves. Then, after a brief hot flare, it was gone again, with no noise or hint of it's source. There was a loud crackling of underbrush and overdry reeds as a small, black-clad figure shot into the grasslands.

"Guess his leg's better." Xeros commented quietly, her voice maintaining a certain amused swing to it.

"Guess Jak's got a secret." Axel said, frowning slightly as the dingy man reappeared from behind the bush.

"No so much of a secret." Xeros said lightly, managing to be cryptic and disinterested at once as she began walking away.

_Fucking mind reader._ Axel thought as he followed.


	17. Gloaming

Xeros, Jak and Daxter seemed particularly tense as they wound around the larger clumps of harsh grass. Daxter almost crapped his tiny pants when a small flock of Searchlight Heartless appeared in front of the group. Sora sent the band into Fiction early in Kingdom Hearts I, and they had somehow managed to avoid more powerful foes since then. However, their decision to engage the three touchy action heroes was a poor one, and Axel, Xeros and Jak made short work of them. Daxter watched. Similar small enemies would appear on occasion, but even the meekest Metalheads from Jak's native Media would cause Xeros, Jak and Daxter to flinch.

After one incident when Jak emptied an entire clip of valuable 'blue' ammo into what turned out to be Stuart Little, Axel became even more skeptical of his companions sanity. "This 'Nny' guy has you jumping at shadows. Is he really that bad, or are you guys just losing it? Something in the water perhaps?"

"He's that bad." Xeros said humorlessly.

The hours of subsequent travel did nothing to relieve Axel's doubts about partners' stability, though he did begin to conceive alternate and more appealing explanations for their jumpiness. _With a name like 'Nny' he can't be that bad. Maybe he's just a myth, or some quirk of Fiction folklore. I mean, I never did ask Xeros if she actually saw her people killed, or if they just kind of disappeared. Seemed like a touchy subject. Anyway, I'd be willing to bet this Nny if he, or it or whatever exists, probably depends on stealth to kill. Face to face, he's probably a pussy. With Xeros and Jak on their toes, he wouldn't stand a chance. Not to mention me._

Axel's smug ballad of his superiority was interrupted when a forearm smashed the small of his back and forced him to the ground. "What the HELL!" He roared, chakrams blazing to life. That's when he noticed the needled half buried in the dusky earth, inches from his nose. They had come very close to piercing his skull.

"Nny! You son of a bitch show yourself!" Xeros shouted as she brandished her gisarme's sleek form. Her lips were drawn back over her clenched teeth, and her brow was taunt with rage. Any hint of that dispassionate fog that normally dulled her reactions was gone.

Axel turned his gaze to see Jak hefting his weapon, pointing it every which way but finding no target. Judging by the size of the lump at the base of his skull, Axel guessed that it had been Jak who had spared him the unexpected acupuncture.

A slight thump drew everyone's attention to what seemed to have been the only unobserved direction. With his black gothic attire, slim figure and strange haircut, Nny would have not cut a terribly intimidating figure had it not been for the large knives he held with practiced delicacy. Closer inspection of his shadowy form revealed that Nny carried a small arsenal of torture devices, all slightly grimy with blood and other more unspeakable fluids.

"What the Hell do you want with me?" Xeros growled, seeming to bristle like a provoked wolf.

"You know what I want." Nny said lightly, as though he was discussing the weather. "For you to open the village to all Fan Characters."

"I don't run the village anymore. I'm sure you know that." Xeros hissed, "I'm also sure that you know your request is illogical."

"If you asked Sheara personally, I'm sure she would be happy to make a change in her policy." Nny said, lunging forward. Xeros parried has attack, and both opponents came out of the engagement unscathed. "And I hope you know the difference between 'right' and 'easy'." Nny continued as though the small clash had not even occurred.

He attacked again, with a lightning quick movement that Xeros barely had time to read and react to. As he landed blow after blow along the length of her gisarme, he kept talking as though his mouth and mind were disconnected from his body's actions.

"You see, the problem with Xeros here is that all those outside of her little friend group are expendable. At one time, I'm sure she would have traded all the lives in Fiction to be with her Axel again. Now, she banks on even more superficial things, like talent. Oh yes, you had better hope to be the most skilled in her party, otherwise she might just throw you to the wolves." Nny explained quite calmly.

"Would you shut UP!" Xeros barked, risking an attack. She leapt forward to attack Nny with a downward slice from her gisarme, executioner style, but he moved far too quickly to be taken by such a grand movement.

"Actually, if you think about it, Xeros represents a lot of what is wrong with the capitalist system. Unless you have some apparent use for the higher powers, you are left out to dry. No second chances, no fucking mercy. Sad world, right?" Nny used Xeros' recovery time from her attack to score a hit on her forearm. He would have gotten her neck with his second knife as well, had she not thought to duck and roll.

"You think you are so fucking great, bitch, but who the Hell are you to judge." Nny concluded, beginning another volley of strikes.

"Like you're one to talk!" Xeros snapped in reply, parrying Nny's attacks with more vigor.

Meanwhile, Axel had recovered from his blow to the head and was preparing to step into the fight. Just as he was about to send a blaze of flame at Nny, Jak grabbed his shoulder. "Hang on. Don't get involved in this." He warned, though he kept his eyes on the battle.

"Why, for some retarded reason like 'this is her fight'?" Axel asked mockingly.

"No, because first off, the only reason she's lasted so long against him is because she knows his fighting style. You don't. And second, in case you haven't noticed, Nny is a lot faster than Xeros. Any attack you throw into the mix will probably hit her, not him. Get it?" Jak said harshly, as though chiding a particularly slow child.

Axel longed to retaliate with some sniping response, but he grudgingly realized that Jak was right. _Damn. I should have realized about their speed difference though. If I sent some fire over there, Nny would probably leap right over it and Xeros would blunder right in. Stupid of me._

However, it was becoming clear that Xeros needed help of some kind. Nny was much more agile than she was, and his weapons allowed for faster strikes. The only advantage that Xeros had was that he seemed to be trying to injure or disfigure her, rather than go for a killing blow right away. For example, one of Nny's attacks seemed to culminate with a strike at her cheeks and ears, and though he only clipped her cheekbone, his intention of torment was clear.

"Owch uh I mean 'You can do it Xeros! Go you'!" Daxter shouted half-heartedly, trying to make up for his audile wincing whenever Nny managed to slice Xeros.

"Thanks." Xeros muttered sarcastically as she prevented Nny from scalping her. She was also beginning to think his blades were tipped with a mild sedative, because with each blow she took, her movements became slower and more erratic. _Not good._ She thought to herself.

One of Xeros' more powerful and well executed blocks almost flung Nny into Jak and Axel. Jak grunted in surprise and hustled away from the slender man, but Axel stood his ground, chakrams in hand.

"I'm not here for you today. Consider yourself lucky." Nny said, eying Axel's hair, "But I do have some advice. Even Stevens, Axel, the past can come back to haunt you."

"You seem really eager to make everyone live life your way." Axel said in a low, angry voice as his slipped into his battle stance. Nny merely shrugged and went back to railing on Xeros.

"Freak." Jak commented in disgust, indicating Nny.

"Yeah, more than a few screws loose there. More like the whole frame's shaky." Daxter commented. Then he added with some unease, "Uh is Xeros gonna..."

"What die? Why do we care." Jak said hotly as Nny sliced Xeros' thigh.

Nny saw that his enemy was almost finished. Xeros was using her gisarme as a third leg to support her weight. Though she was panting heavily and barely standing, her eyes retained an unabashed hatred which Nny didn't seem to care about.

"You see Jak, Axel and Daxter, this is why you need to promote equality of sorts. Whether it's between Fan Characters and Originals, Fan Characters and other Fan Characters or any combination of differing races you can think of." He was approaching Xeros slowly, a small needle in hand. "Now, if you don't mind, I'll be taking her with me. Perhaps she'll be more receptive to my message if I..."

Jak, Axel and Daxter never found out what Nny was planning on doing to Xeros, because with a rising sweep of her gisarme she took off his right leg. "Bastard." she hissed as she fell into a downward strike which loped Nny's head off. For several seconds, Xeros stood in perfect silence, hunched over the corpse as though she was unable to straighten her spine from the final attack. Her back was to Jak and Axel, but they saw thick drops of blood falling from what were probably her facial wounds and onto Nny's body. Then she stood slowly, straightening her back deliberately and heaving her gisarme as though it suddenly weighed as much as Atlas' burden. Strangely, it looked like she was readying for another strike.

"Wait, what the Hell do you think you're doing." Axel asked, sounding disgusted.

"This...thing...killed some of my best warriors to prove a point to me. Well, I'm going to prove a little point to him." Xeros said huskily, aiming her gisarme over Nny's prone corpse. Then she brought it down. Again and again.


	18. Grey

By the time Xeros was done, the mess left behind was no longer recognizable as human remains, much less those of any particular Original

By the time Xeros was done, the mess left behind was no longer recognizable as human remains, much less those of any particular Original. Just a small, well minced pile of skin, bone and cloth smeared in what could have easily been grey and red jelly was all that was left to cover in loose dirt and straw. Xeros kept one of Nny's distinctive shoe buckles as a medal, a practice which Jak seemed indifferent towards but Axel was revolted by. By the time the group was under way again, Xeros was already beginning to heal, as per the restorative qualities of Fiction. She was also utterly silent. Axel could understand her need for revenge, even her need for murder, but the mutilation of Nny's corpse had disturbed him. Xeros had never seemed especially stable to him, but he assumed correctly that nobody in Fiction really was. Now he viewed her as downright psychotic.

"We'll need to make a detour." Xeros said abruptly, her fog returned completely. "Through the Heartwoods."

"The Hell? You really are trying to get us killed, aren't you?" Jak said, shocked.

"Explanation please." Axel griped, becoming extremely tired of not knowing what was going on.

"The Heartwoods are a dangerous portion of fixed land, occupied most often by bands of rogue Fan Characters. They're the base of operation for no less than five raider tribes and countless fictional villains. Sephiroth, for example, once made his home there. Avatars don't like going there, which is advantageous for us, since I believe we will have a great deal of offended Avatars after us fairly soon." Xeros explained in her deadpan way.

"And why would that be?" Axel asked skeptically.

"Because I killed Nny. He was a fairly popular Original, and will be missed by his fan club. I'm sure they would like to exact revenge on us." Xeros said unflinchingly.

"You got us into one Hell of a fucking mess, bitch." Jak growled, raising his rifle and aiming the barrel at Xeros' head. "Maybe if I shoot you, the Avatars will leave well enough alone."

"I wouldn't bet on it." Xeros said simply. "In fact, denying them their revenge might just enrage them more."

"In that case, get out of here." Jak ordered, shooing her with his gun. "You go our way, we go ours."

"Is that really fair Jak? If she hadn't killed him, he would have certainly killed her. Maybe one of us." Axel pointed out smoothly.

"She's insane Axel! A liability." Jak argued with a scowl. "You really can't trust Fan Characters to be able to control themselves. I mean, when you're invented by a hormone crazed teenage girl...the apple doesn't fall far from the tree."

"Look, I thought we established that we three.." Axel began.

"Four!" Daxter interrupted.

"...would be better off with each other rather than traveling separately. What Xeros did was pretty stupid, and we're all going to suffer for it, but I think we are all going to suffer more if we split up now." Axel pointed out.

Jak considered quietly before allowing his weapon to slack, "Jackass." he said, in the form of a concession to Axel's argument.

"Good. Now that we're all friends, let's get this show on the road. The next 12 hour shift in scenery probably won't be as kind as this current one is." Axel said, nodding for Xeros to continue.

Axel's guess at the next shift turned out to be correct, because the next desert that manifested itself was a barren, alien landscape with deep canyons cutting stark scars across the otherwise flat, red rock. Perhaps there was water at the bottom of these ravines, but none of the party was willing to take the plunge to check.

"I recommend resting for at least eight hours, and waiting this desert out." Xeros proposed. "We won't make much ground trying to avoid those canyons."

"Finally, a good suggestion out of you." Jak grumbled. "I'll take the first sleeping shift."

"I'll guard then." Xeros said, summoning her gisarme and sitting cross-legged on the ground. "You can sleep too Axel. I have an eye for each of you."

"Uh hello? What about me?" Daxter said, waving his hand. "Who's gonna keep an eye on me?"

"Sorry, I wasn't taking food items into account. I'm sure I can spare some attention to ensure something horrible doesn't carry you off." Xeros said, demonstrating that perhaps her fog wasn't corrupting her personality as much as before.

"Actually, I'll pass." Axel said, sitting down as well.

"On what, sleeping?" Jak asked with disbelief.

"Yeah. I'm trying to figure out what Nny said to me. That warning." Axel said off handedly, summoning some flames to toy with as he thought.

"I wouldn't take Nny's words to seriously. He was deranged." Xeros warned, watching the flames scurry alone Axel's fingers.

"Says you." Jak snorted, rolling over to sleep. Daxter cast Xeros a scared glance and scuttled behind Jak's boot. In seconds, both of them were sleeping lightly. Axel noticed Jak's ears remained peaked, listening for any disturbing sound.

Hours passed in silence as Axel ideally played with his fire. What bothered him about Nny's warning was the 'Even Stevens' bit of the speech. _I know that there are plenty of people who would want to 'haunt' me, probably get even with me. But that's not much of a hint. 'Even Stevens'...it just seems out of place._

"Axel." Xeros said quietly, drawing him out of thought.

"Mm?" He asked, slightly annoyed at being disturbed from his puzzling.

"Nny's corpse...I'm sorry you saw me do that." She said flatly, staring fixedly at the grey horizon.

"But you're not sorry that you did it." Axel pointed out.

"No." She admitted. "You wouldn't understand unless you knew what he did to people. One of my Fan Characters, Kelsie...she was supposed to fit into a Media called 'Harry Potter' or something...she was a great magic user, but very young. Nny scalped her while she was still alive, deconstructed her brain and bled her out. She took a long time to die. He did it because I was selfish." Guilt snuck in behind Xeros' pupils, but it did not weaken her gaze. "He haunted the village like a plague, and I'm sure he took other lives as well, from other villages or traveling groups. Death was not an accurate punishment for his crimes."

Axel narrowed his eyes and examined Xeros' face. "Why are you telling me this?" She didn't say anything, still glaring forward. "Do you plan on apologizing to Jak and Daxter as well?" he persisted.

"I'll be over here." Xeros said smoothly, standing up and moving away from the circle.

_What the Hell was I thinking?_ She berated herself as she tried to move calmly _He isn't the one I care about. Just a pretty face._ Xeros kicked a rock in frustration _Imitation or no, I'd rather have the Axel I knew than that bastard Original__. _Ferocity smote the memory of sadness that rose like bile whenever she thought of the times before her author wrote 'the end' and severed the soulless semblance of romance Xeros and Axel had shared. _I'll find him. I've searched this side of the mountains again and again, and never found him. When we cross, I'll keep looking, and he and I will cross to Reality. Together. Fuck that Original. The face can be the same, but the character's different._ This seemingly satisfactory rhetoric should have settled the matter, except for a disgusting purr from a dark corner of her cerebrum which she dared not address directly or even acknowledge; the superstitious fear of saying the Devil's name. _What if it's this new character you want to cross with now? What if you want to experience feeling for him…?_

Meanwhile, Axel remained unconcerned by Xeros' clumsy apology and subsequent suspicious departure. If she was paired with a version of him in her story, it was only reasonable that she would be at least a little attracted to the Original version. _And besides, I'm so damn irresistible, who can help it?_ He smirked. In fact, he considered her interest in him, if it was even strong enough to call it that, extremely useful. _Makes me the less likely choice to be...how did Nny put it? 'Thrown to the wolves'._ He thought with satisfaction. _And speaking of Nny...there is still the matter of that warning he gave me. Talk about annoying with a capital 'A'._ Axel reclined on the rock, looking up at that unfailingly grey sky, not obviously dawn or dusk. _Guess it's what you make of it. Dawn, dusk..._ Then it came to him. "Oh fuck." he said aloud. "Even. Vexen."


End file.
